These images are the first time we have seen the sun’s south pole

We have seen the sun’s south pole for the first time, courtesy of the pioneering Solar Orbiter spacecraft. These images and other measurements should help us refine forecasts of the sun’s activity.

Taking a picture of the solar poles is harder than it sounds, because to do so a spacecraft must leave the ecliptic plane, a flat disc around the sun in which almost every object in the solar system orbits. The Solar Orbiter, a joint mission between the European Space Agency and NASA, has done just that. Launched in 2020, it has gradually been tilting its orbit and has now reached a sufficiently steep angle to glimpse the sun’s never-before-seen polar regions.

ESA has now released the first pictures of the sun’s south pole, taken between March, when the spacecraft was orbiting at an angle 15 degrees below the ecliptic plane, and today, when it reached 17 degrees below.

Seeing the images for the first time felt special, says Lucie Green at University College London, who helped develop the Solar Orbiter. “It felt like we’re at a privileged time that these previously hidden areas are now available to us.”

The Solar Orbiter has also taken measurements of the magnetic fields and high-energy radiation spilling out of the sun’s south pole, which ESA has now released. Being able to make measurements of the magnetic fields at the sun’s south pole will help us better understand the solar cycle, which rises and falls in intensity in roughly 11-year periods, says Green. “In order to fully understand the sun as a star, we need to make measurements of the magnetic field around its sphere, and the polar magnetic fields are a really important part of that.”

“It might seem counterintuitive, but one of the most critical regions on the sun for forecasting space weather at Earth is the one place we can’t get a good look from Earth: the solar poles,” says Mathew Owens at the University of Reading, UK.

“These new images are our furthest-ever peak around the corner at the southern pole. As the Solar Orbiter mission progresses, it will climb to higher latitude and give even better views of the poles,” he says. For space weather forecasting, knowing the magnetic structure of the poles at solar minimum, the period of lowest solar activity which is due in three to four years time, will be particularly valuable, says Owens.

The Solar Orbiter has also caught a glimpse of the sun’s north pole, but ESA is waiting for the data to be returned to Earth. In the meantime, you can look at an ESA approximation of the north pole made in 2018 with some clever camera trickery.