The Sun is our nearest star, provides us with warmth and light. Until Galileo invented the telescope, it was once thought to be a perfect orb, free of blemishes, eternal and changeless. Sunspots are the most well known hints that the Sun's surface is constantly changing. Larger than the Earth, and with 10,000 times more intensity than the Earth's magnetic field, these are the breeding grounds for some of the most violent storms in the solar system!

The number of sunspots comes in cycles lasting from 6 to 11 years; the Sunspot Cycle. With modern technology and space satellites, this solar activity cycle can now be detected in the ebb and flow of other phenomena on the Sun and on the Earth. Among the most enigmatic storms are the solar flares can erupt near sunspots. In a matter of 20 minutes, magnetic fields can heat gases to tens of thousands of degrees and release more energy than a thousand atomic bombs. Some of this gas can be hurled out from the Sun at millions of miles per hour in what are called coronal mass ejections. Both solar flares and coronal mass ejections can be very disruptive to human activity on earth and in space.

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