A team of astronomers from the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA), part of the DST, has discovered diminutive plasma loops in the Sun’s corona, shedding light on how the star stores and releases magnetic energy—even on minuscule scales. These “tiny loops” span just 3,000–4,000 km, with widths under 100 km, and last only a few minutes.
Detected using high-resolution data from the Goode Solar Telescope, NASA’s IRIS, and SDO, the loops are vivid arcs glowing in visible, UV, and EUV wavelengths. Despite their size, they exhibit temperatures of several million K, confirmed via Differential Emission Measure (DEM) analysis.
“These tiny loops live fast—and die young…offer a new window into how magnetic energy is stored and released in the solar atmosphere on small scales.” The loops may help explain longstanding puzzles like coronal heating and microflare triggers. Small-scale magnetic reconnection events—called nanoflares—have been posited as a heating mechanism; these loops could be their observable signature
High-resolution observations (e.g., Solar Orbiter/EUI) have shown similar compact loop-like brightening events on the quiet Sun, propagating at 25–60 km/s, likely linked to micro/nanoflares. Meanwhile, NASA insights reveal that flickering patterns in coronal loops can precede major flares by 2–6 hours, functioning as early predictive markers for solar activity.