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The sun is a beautifully magnetically driven

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star, but we can't actually see magnetic field lines.

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They are essentially invisible, and so we have to turn to models

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in order for us to see the global magnetic structure of the

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sun. What we are looking at here is one such model.

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The color coding represents what we call open magnetic field lines,

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which means that they extend from within the sun, all the way out to

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really far out in space.

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The green and the purple have a north and a south polarity. The white lines are closed magnetic field

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lines. They come out of the surface of the sun, and they loop around and close

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near the solar surface.

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You can see how dynamic the sun is as well. Magnetic field lines interact with each other

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They cause big explosions to occur on the sun, and that's one reason

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it's extremely important to study the magnetic structure of the sun, especially

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on a global scale. And again, models are one way we can do this, especially on a global scale.

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because they allow us to model where the field lines are, how

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they are going to interact with each other when the sun rotates, and then

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how that causes solar storms, like coronal mass ejections and solar flares.

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Sometimes the sun is quiet, sometimes magnetic field lines aren't

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doing a whole lot, but other times, you see these bright regions on the sun

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where you have closed loops. That's where activity can occur,

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where the flares can occur. The whole thing is really magnetically connected.

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