Scientists have captured the sharpest image ever of our sun's surface. This view has revealed incredible new details about the inner mechanisms driving stellar activity.

What is it?

An international team of researchers using the U.S. National Science Foundation's Inouye Solar Telescope has captured the highest-resolution view of the sun's surface.

In analyzing observations from this telescope, the team, made up of researchers from the National Solar Observatory, the NSF NCR High Altitude Observatory and the German Max Planck Institut für Sonnensystemforschung, discovered strange patterns on the sun's surface. The whirling patterns, they found, are actually evidence of what's called Kelvin-Helmholtz instability (KHI), or instability that happens when there is a change in velocity of fluids.

Why is it incredible?

This image is groundbreaking. Capturing the highest-resolution view of the sun's surface is a massive accomplishment, and in the time-lapse video above, you can even see the fluid dynamics on the surface of the sun in motion.

But this view is much more than a beautiful, high-resolution image. These observations have revealed swirls on the sun's surface at the edges of the magnetic areas, allowing the team to identify KHI on the sun's surface. This fluid instability has long been suspected on the sun, but these observations are the first time they have ever been directly seen like this.

“We believe that the discovery of Kelvin-Helmholtz Instability in the solar photosphere, backed up by analysis of numerical simulations, is a major step forward in our understanding of the dynamics and evolution of solar and stellar plasma, and will serve as a basis for future discoveries," David Boboltz, the deputy director at the National Solar Observatory, said in a statement.

A paper describing these findings was published recently in the journal Nature.

Millions of people across Europe and North America will witness a solar eclipse on Wednesday, Aug. 12, but the event will vary greatly depending on the location. A narrow corridor stretching from Greenland to northeastern Spain will experience a total solar eclipse, much of Europe will enjoy a deep partial eclipse, and parts of North America will see a smaller partial eclipse.

Want to know what you can expect to see from where you are? Here's an overview of the event from various locations, along with the exact viewing times for the Aug. 12 solar eclipse.

Remember, it's important to wear certified solar eclipse glasses during all partial phases of the eclipse. Totality ‪—‬ when the sun's face is completely blocked by the moon ‪—‬ is the only time it's safe to remove your eclipse glasses. (It’s not too late to order last-minute eclipse glasses if you don’t have a pair on hand.)

If you're in the path of totality

If you're fortunate enough to be inside the 180-mile-wide (290 kilometers) path of totality — the path of the dark shadow of the moon — in eastern Greenland, western Iceland or northeastern Spain, you'll experience the moon completely covering the sun for up to 2 minutes, 18 seconds. The sky will darken to twilight, bright stars and planets may appear in the daytime sky, and the sun's spectacular corona (its wispy outer atmosphere) will become visible. Here’s a handy guide to all the gear you’ll need to get the most out of totality.

The closer you are to the centerline of the path, the longer totality will last. But the most important consideration is to stay within the boundaries of the path, because it has a hard edge. Madrid, for example, is barely outside the path and will see a 99.99% partial eclipse — and no totality whatsoever. The partial phases last an hour on each side of totality.

Here's when totality will occur in various locations for the Aug. 12 total solar eclipse:

• Scoresby Sund, Greenland: 4:35 p.m. WGST (up to 2 minutes, 17 seconds)
• Reykjavik, Iceland: 5:48 p.m. GMT (60 seconds)
• León, Spain: 8:28 p.m. CEST (1 minute, 45 seconds)
• Soria, Spain: 8:29 p.m. CEST (1 minute, 43 seconds)
• S'Arenal, Mallorca, Spain: 8:31 p.m. CEST (1 minute, 36 seconds)

If you're in North America

Viewers in North America will see a modest partial eclipse, with the biggest eclipse seen from northern and eastern Canada, Alaska and the northeastern U.S. The farther northeast you are, the deeper the eclipse will appear. Eclipse glasses are essential at every stage of the two-hour event, because there will be no totality. Here are the times of maximum eclipse in various locations:

• Iqaluit, Nunavut: 1:24 p.m. EDT (61% eclipse)
• St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador: 3:00 p.m. NDT (53%)
• Fairbanks, Alaska: 8:27 a.m. AKDT (37%)
• Anchorage, Alaska: 8:21 a.m. AKDT (28%)
• Bangor, Maine: 1:53 p.m. EDT (23%)
• Quebec City: 1:46 p.m. EDT (24%)
• Montreal: 1:45 p.m. EDT (18%)
• Boston: 1:55 p.m. EDT (16%)
• New York: 1:54 p.m. EDT (9%)

If you want to watch totality from outside the path, there are many live stream options available, including planned streams from NASA and the European Space Agency.

If you're elsewhere in Europe and North Africa

Most of Europe and far northwestern Africa will see a spectacular deep partial eclipse, with more than 90% of the sun covered in many western cities. Although the eclipse will never become total, it will still be an impressive sight, though solar eclipse glasses will be required throughout the event. Here are the times of maximum eclipse in some major cities:

• Madrid: 8:32 p.m. CEST (99.9%)
• Barcelona: 8:29 p.m. CEST (99.8%)
• Algiers, Algeria: 7:33 p.m. CET (96%)
• Nice, France: 8:24 p.m. CEST (95%)
• Lisbon, Portugal: 7:36 p.m. WEST (94%)
• Dublin, Ireland: 7:10 p.m. BST (94%)
• Cardiff, Wales: 7:13 p.m. BST (93%)
• Belfast, Northern Ireland: 7:08 p.m. BST (93%)
• Paris: 8:17 p.m. CEST (92%)
• Tangier, Morocco: 7:40 p.m. WEST (92%)
• London: 7:13 p.m. BST (91%)
• Edinburgh, Scotland: 7:05 p.m. BST (91% eclipse)

To check exactly what you'll see and when, enter your location on an interactive map of the eclipse, which will give you a schedule for when the eclipse begins, peaks and ends where you are.

New images captured by the world's most powerful solar telescope have revealed something that was hiding in plain sight on the sun for 150 years: thousands of tiny whirlpools twisting across our star's surface. The ultra-detailed observations could help to explain some of the sun's most violent behavior as well as hint at the answer to a long-standing solar mystery.

The new time-lapse footage offers the first direct proof of a long-predicted phenomenon called Kelvin-Helmholtz instability. The effect itself isn't new to science; it's named for physicists Lord Kelvin and Hermann von Helmholtz, who described it in the 19th century. The physicists found that whenever two fluids slide past each other at different speeds, the friction between them, or shear, rolls into spiraling patterns. However, this is the first time this effect has been seen on the sun, where that shear plays out between neighboring streams of solar plasma.

Researchers captured the swirls using the U.S. National Science Foundation's Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope in Hawaii and then compared the images against computer simulations of the sun's visible surface, called the photosphere. The findings were published Aug. 5 in the journal Nature.

The resulting time-lapse footage from the telescope is unlike anything solar physicists have captured before. It shows dozens of tiny vortices clustering along the edges of magnetic regions, some accompanied by delicate, dark stripes known as striations, according to a statement from the National Science Foundation. The telescope's resolution is sharp enough to pick out structures just tens of miles across — a scale so fine that the vortices had gone completely undetected until now.

When the researchers lined the images up against their simulations, the match was close enough ‪—‬ down to the average spacing between vortices ‪—‬ to confirm that they'd finally caught the instability in action.

Beyond the impressive visuals, researchers think these swirls may serve an important function. By constantly twisting and mixing the sun's magnetic-field lines, these vortices may play a part in building up the energy behind solar flares and coronal mass ejections.

The effect also might help to explain the long-standing mystery of why the sun's outer atmosphere, or corona, reaches temperatures of around 2 million degrees Fahrenheit (around 1 million degrees Celsius) while its surface remains hundreds of thousands of degrees cooler, Thomas Rimmele, chief technologist at the National Solar Observatory, said in the statement.

The team now plans to use computer programs to automatically track these vortices across future observations. This will help them measure exactly how much these swirls contribute to heating the corona and driving the explosive space weather that can disrupt satellites, communications and power grids on Earth.

See how much you know about the sun with our sun quiz!

Every total solar eclipse travels from west to east, because the moon and Earth move in the same direction — counterclockwise, or from west to east. Earth rotates eastward once every 24 hours, and the moon also travels eastward as it orbits our planet. Because the moon's shadow moves across Earth faster than the planet rotates beneath it, the path of totality (the route of the moon's umbra, the darkest part of its inner shadow) always sweeps from west to east.

But if you've looked at maps of the Aug. 12, 2026, total solar eclipse, you may have noticed something puzzling. At first glance, the eclipse appears to do the exact opposite. The path seems to begin in far northern Siberia, near the North Pole, before heading toward eastern Greenland, making it look as though the moon's shadow were traveling from east to west. It then appears to curve over western Iceland and northern Spain. So what's going on?

The apparent reversal from Siberia to Greenland is an illusion. It's created by geometry, but it's also a result of viewing the eclipse on a flat map instead of on a globe. The moon's shadow follows a smooth arc across Earth's curved surface and never changes direction, as shown by this animation. This eclipse passes so close to the North Pole that the distortion caused by map projections makes the track appear to bend back on itself, when in reality, the shadow is simply sweeping over the top of the world.

"The path of this eclipse also has a strong north-south component, the combined effect of Earth's rotation and the tilt of both Earth's axis and the Moon's orbit," experts at NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio explained. "Combined with Earth's rotation, the umbra's eastern motion during the first half of its travel is effectively canceled out."

This causes the shadow to sweep over the Arctic in a broad curve, instead of following the more familiar west-to-east path. On a flat map, that curved route can make it look as though the eclipse briefly reverses direction, even though it never actually does.

The moon's shadow has two parts — the narrow umbra, where observers experience totality, and the much broader penumbra, where only a partial eclipse is visible. The widths of these shadows depend on the moon's distance from Earth, while their speed is influenced by the moon's orbit, Earth's rotation and the geometry of the eclipse.

If you are among the millions of people who will be in the moon's penumbra on Aug. 12, make sure to always wear a pair of certified solar eclipse glasses (or use a solar filter on your telescope or binoculars) to view the partial eclipse. It is never safe to look directly at the sun, except during the moment of totality, when the sun is 100% covered.

If you aren't in the right spot for the total solar eclipse, fear not. A near-total lunar eclipse will be visible over most of North America just two weeks later, and there are plenty of other summer skywatching highlights to watch for.

Skywatchers across North America and Europe should mark Wednesday, Aug. 12 on their calendars. From a daytime solar eclipse to the peak of the Perseid meteor shower beneath a moonless sky, the date offers an exceptionally rare combination of celestial events within a 24-hour period. Add brilliant Venus and the glowing band of the Milky Way after sunset, and the result is a full day of astronomy that could become one of the standout skywatching opportunities of the year.

The first spectacle arrives during daylight as the moon partially covers the sun across Alaska, eastern Canada and parts of the northeastern U.S. A dramatic total solar eclipse will be visible along a narrow path stretching across eastern Greenland, western Iceland and northern Spain — and that's where eclipse chasers will be. However, about 779 million people in North America, Europe and North Africa will see at least a 10% partial eclipse, according to Time and Date.

Northern Canada will experience North America's deepest partial eclipse, with parts of Nunavut in the Canadian Arctic seeing up to 93% of the sun covered, according to Time And Date; large eastern cities like Toronto, Ottawa and Quebec will see between 8% and 24% coverage. The best views in the U.S. will be from Alaska and the Northeast, with Fairbanks, Alaska, seeing 37% of the sun covered, and Boston seeing 16%.

In Europe, London will see a 91% eclipse and Paris will get 92%. No matter your viewing location, it's important to use ISO 12312-2 certified solar eclipse glasses throughout the entire partial eclipse. Also remember to fit binoculars, telescopes and cameras with solar filters before pointing them at the sun. (Here’s a great selection of gear that will help you safely watch the eclipse from anywhere).

After sunset, the day's second major event begins. Brilliant Venus will be easy to spot as it reaches dichotomy, the point at which the planet appears half illuminated. Through a small telescope or large stargazing binoculars, skywatchers should see Venus resembling a tiny half-moon as it moves closer to Earth.

Once darkness falls, the day's third and fourth major events will begin. The annual Perseid meteor shower will peak during the overnight hours of Aug. 12-13, and this year's display benefits from one crucial advantage: a new moon. With no moonlight washing out faint meteors, observers under truly dark skies could see between 50 and 75 meteors per hour, while even suburban locations should enjoy frequent "shooting stars," according to The Planetary Society.

The best time to look is from midnight to 2 a.m. local time, when the sky is darkest and the constellation Perseus is highest in the sky. As a final bonus, those under dark, rural skies will see the Milky Way arch overhead, providing one of the finest views of our home galaxy all year.

A daytime solar eclipse, a moon-free Perseid meteor shower, a dazzling Venus and spectacular views of the Milky Way make Aug. 12 a great opportunity for anyone with an interest in the night sky. If skies are clear, it could be the single greatest day and night for skywatching in years.

See how much you know about the sun with our sun quiz!

For several years now, astronomers who study the sun have faced a little mystery — our star seemed to hold too little silver. Whenever scientists examined the sun's outer layers, they've seen significantly less silver than they've expected to find.

Where, then, did the missing silver go?

As it turns out, this mystery may finally be solved. Newly published research suggests that the sun's missing silver may have been hiding in plain sight all along.

At first, the real mystery might seem to be why you'd seek silver in the sun at all. After all, 98.5% of the sun's mass is made from lightweight hydrogen and helium. Silver is just a tiny fraction of the remaining 1.5%, which also includes traces of other heavy elements like iron and copper.

These trace elements can illuminate the history of the cosmos. Silver is thought to form when dying stars violently explode in supernovas. When astronomers find silver in the sun and other stars, they can retrace the silver's origins and how stars have evolved over the eons.

"By studying the light of stars of different types and ages, we hope to understand where silver is formed in the universe, and how it has been distributed throughout the Milky Way over time," says Sema Caliskan, the lead author of the research and now a postdoc at the University of Liège in Belgium, in a statement.

Silver is particularly interesting because it's also found in utterly ancient meteorites called CI chondrites. These meteorites formed from the same primordial matter that created the sun, 4.6 billion years ago. As a result, when scientists break into CI chondrites that have fallen to Earth, they expect to find silver levels that match those they see in the sun.

Astronomers can measure the latter from afar by looking at sunlight's spectral lines. As light streams out from the sun's heart, it crashes into the atoms of our star's outer layers, which absorb the light at certain wavelengths. Look at a spectrum of sunlight, and you'll see dark lines where light has been absorbed. Atoms of different elements absorb different wavelengths, so each element leaves a distinct fingerprint.

Scientists can pore over these spectral fingerprints to reconstruct what elements created them and in what quantities. Therein lies the mystery: The sun seemed to contain much less silver than CI chondrites would indicate. This missing silver is a source for confusion in the sun's history.

Caliskan and her colleagues wondered if astronomers were missing something. They could not visit the sun in person, but they could still find where the silver might be hidden by simulating the sun's atoms on a computer. If they could create a high-silver model that still spawned the low-silver spectral lines, that model could be a good guess for the silver's whereabouts.

Other scientists had tried this before to limited success, but their simulations had been relatively simple. As light strikes an atom, the light has all sorts of intricate effects on the atom's innards. These effects can alter how the atom absorbs the light and, therefore, change how astronomers see that light.

Past models hadn't accounted for many of these tricky "non-equilibrium effects", because simulating them is far easier said than done. They're messy and complex and they vary a great deal from atom to atom.

In fact, no known scientists had ever tried to simulate a silver atom with non-equilibrium effects before Caliskan and her fellow investigators took on the challenge. They tried with their best guesses and the power of the Tetralith supercomputer in Linköping, Sweden.

Indeed, these non-equilibrium effects seem to explain the silver mystery. Based on their model, Caliskan and colleagues calculated that the sun holds 55% more silver than astronomers have measured.

This isn't a perfect match for the CI chondrites, but it's close enough that investigators can rule out any extraordinary cause. Instead, the missing silver may have been right there, in the sun all along, simply occluded from astronomers' view by tricks of physics. Next, Caliskan and colleagues plan to use this method to simulate other types of stars.

They published their work in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics in July 2026.