Should You Really Worry about Solar Flares?

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January 26, 2023

Dear Reader, This week, we're not panicking. Our top story is about solar flares—enormous outbursts regularly emitted by our sun as part of its approximately 11-year activity cycle that can occasionally cause problems for us here on Earth. More specifically, our story is about why you shouldn't worry too much about even very strong flares, several of which erupted earlier this month. Although such events are surprisingly routine, they can indeed disrupt and damage power grids and the occasional electronic device. But protective measures can typically mitigate the worst effects. So breathe easy—a space-weather apocalypse probably isn't coming anytime very soon. Elsewhere this week, we have stories on the curiously changing rotation of Earth's inner core, new insights into the spinning innards of stars, the trouble with lunar timekeeping, and more. Enjoy!

Lee Billings, Senior Editor, Space & Physics

Astrophysics Should You Really Worry about Solar Flares? The sun is unleashing powerful outbursts that could strike Earth, but these events are far more common—and much less worrisome—than some hyped headlines suggest By Ed Browne

Geology Why Earth's Inner Core May Be Slowing Down The planet's solid inner core might rotate at a different rate than the rest of the planet, and that rate might be changing By Stephanie Pappas

Astronomy Star Cores Spin Surprisingly Slowly--Scientists Now Think They Know Why Scientists find that magnetic fields and turbulence amplify each other inside stars' hidden layers, slowing down the stellar cores' spin By Stephanie Pappas

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Space Exploration What Time Is It on the Moon? Satellite navigation systems for lunar settlements will require local atomic clocks. Scientists are working out what time they will keep By Elizabeth Gibney,Nature magazine

Astronomy JWST Heralds a New Dawn for Exoplanet Science The James Webb Space Telescope is opening an exciting new chapter in the study of exoplanets and the search for life beyond Earth By Jonathan O'Callaghan

Planetary Science Cataclysmic Collisions May Explain 'Forbidden' Exoplanets A new model could explain the scarcity of certain planet sizes By Daniel Leonard

FROM THE STORE Scientific American Volume 318, Issue 6

QUOTE OF THE DAY "It's definitely not something on the order of 'all the mobile phones in this entire country are fried.' That's not going to happen." The heliophysicist Erika Palmerio, on the vanishingly low likelihood of solar flares damaging consumer electronic devices.

FROM THE ARCHIVE Here's Why Earth Just Had Its Shortest Day on Record How wind, ice and rock may have combined to give our planet its shortest day By Sasha Warren | August 2022

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