Could A Sun Superflare Sterilize Earth? By Dr David Whitehouse BBC News Online's Science Editor 9-22-99 Could our Sun suddenly experience a so-called "superflare" on its surface that could wipe out all life on Earth? That is the possibility, albeit a remote one, that emerges from observations of nearby stars that are similar to our own Sun. Bradley Schaefer of Yale University, along with Jeremy King of the Hubble Space Telescope Science Institute and Constantine Deliyannis of Indiana University, have documented nine cases of other stars, seemingly well-behaved like our Sun, that have suddenly erupted superflares. Two events, seen on the stars K Ceti and pi-Uma, are especially significant because these two stars have been called solar analogues, that is they are almost exactly identical to our Sun. Yet they have been observed to emit superflares, energetic explosions on their surfaces that spray radiation and charged particles out into space. The effect on any planets orbiting them would be catastrophic. Sterilised planets If a superflare occurred on our Sun, then the Earth would be subject to rapid heating, aurorae would ripple in every sky, the ionosphere would break up and the ozone layer would be destroyed. This would allow lethal radiation and charged particles from the Sun to reach the ground, destroying all life-forms except those protected in the deep oceans. From historical data, it is unlikely that our Sun has experienced a superflare during the past 2,000 years. It is likely astronomers would have recorded seeing an oddly-coloured Sun and noticed a short but intense heatwave. There is no record of this. Indeed, the evidence from geological records suggests that such superflares are very rare, if not entirely absent on our Sun, though the researchers cannot rule out the possibility entirely. So what is going on? How can stars like our Sun exhibit such superflares but our own Sun seem well-behaved? Squeezed and amplified The answer may be given in an accompanying paper in a forthcoming issue of the Astrophysical Journal. Bradley Shaefer and Eric Rubenstein of Yale suggest that the superflares are caused by a large planet, the size of Jupiter or larger, orbiting these Sun-like stars. What they believe happens is that the planet's magnetic field gets tangled up with the star's magnetic field and they both become squeezed and amplified, like pulling a knot tighter and tighter. Something eventually gives and the pent-up magnetic energy is explosively released in a gigantic superflare. This is highly unlikely to happen in our Solar System, say these astronomers, because there is no large planet close enough to our Sun. But their analysis has implications for the possibility of life in space. In recent years, many Jupiter-class planets have been discovered closely orbiting some of the nearest stars to our Solar System, raising the possibility that some of these newly-discovered planetary systems may harbour life. If superflares are common in these systems then they may sterilise the surfaces of accompanying planets, making life harder to develop. Alternatively, it may mean that life in these systems would evolve in protected regions such as deep caves or beneath the surface of an ocean.

-- Ct Vronsky (vronsky@anna.com), September 24, 1999

Answers

FROM BIBLE>2ND PETER 3:10. ''the heavens shall pass away with a great noise,and the elements shall melt with fervent heat,the earth also and the WORKS therin shall be burned up.[sounds like a cleansing to me]

-- little man=trusts BIG GOD. (dogs@zianet.com), September 24, 1999.

coming soon, from GODS WORD>''whose voice then shook the earth, but now he hath PROMISED saying,Yet once more I shake not only earth, but also heaven. And this WORD, yet once more,signifieth the removing of those things that are shaken, as of those things that are made,that those things which cannot be shaken may remain.[hebrews 12:26-27] it,s shake-up time folks.-but just the beggining of perilous-times. what is un-shakable ? >faith in CHRIST.

-- it,s prime-time. (dogs@zianet.com), September 24, 1999.

God, please just zap me right here and get it over with. Al, thanks for losing the equal sign.

-- King of Free Estimates (your@town.USA), September 24, 1999.

Oh, now I'm REALLY going to worry.

-- Mara Wayne (MaraWayne@aol.com), September 24, 1999.

Solar weather from 9/22/99...very strange "event".

This image is actually backed up by the following GOES data...note the spike. How appropriate that this article came out on the same day : )

I have lots of fun thinking about this stuff.

Mike

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-- Michael Taylor (mtdesign3@aol.com), September 24, 1999.

Oh, brother!

One more trip to Sam's. Sunscreen. Five gallon bucket. SPF 8000.

-- Lon Frank (lgal@exp.net), September 24, 1999.

Hey, that solar picture looks like a compact disc.

-- (well@it.does), September 24, 1999.

Nothing personal but with all the other things in life to deal with, I won't spend any of my precious time worrying about some solar flare scorching my sorry ass.

-- (rcarver@home.xcom), September 24, 1999.

Actually, that odd 'flare' looks like something tracked in front of the sat camera. Notice it doesn't flare straight out from the sun; difficult to imagine a source event that could do that, especially at the implied scale. The dark spoke on the lower right is much more interesting as the source of that graph spike.

Either way. What the original article up there failed to mention was that superflares operate the same way conventional flares do, albeit on a much bigger scale. If it erupts in a direction that isn't inline with the Earth's position when it crosses our orbit, none of those consequences come to pass. We'd have to be hit with one, first. We'd still see any superflare that wasn't facing almost directly away from us, though.

-- Harl (harlanquin@aohell.com), September 24, 1999.

Sorry, meant 'lower left'.... "Dyslexics of the world, Untie."

-- Harl (harlanquin@aohell.com), September 24, 1999.

Now hold on guys! I haven't finished internalizing the Nov. earthquake predictions yet. Gees, hold your horses. One thing at a time.

Michael, that looks like my copy of Win95 CD might look like while it's whirling away doing an install. You sure it's not a win95 CD picture?

-- Chris (#$%^&@pond.com), September 24, 1999.