NASA Captures Haunting Halloween Sun with Jack-O-Lantern Grin

Here on Earth, people are gearing up for Halloween by carving pumpkins into jack-o-lanterns and preparing their costumes. Now, it looks like the sun has also decided to show off just in time for the scariest night of the year. NASA has captured a picture of the sun and its active regions-and it looks more than a little bit like a skull-like grin on a jack-o-lantern.

On Oct. 8, 2014, NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) captured a picture of the active regions of our nearest star. These active regions appear bright since they emit more light and energy, which are markers of an intense and complex set of magnetic fields hovering in the sun's atmosphere, the corona. It's these bright areas that give the sun the festive expression that looks so similar to carved pumpkins during Halloween.

The SDO is actually the first mission launched for NASA's Living With a Star (LWS) program, which is designed to understand the causes of solar variability and its impacts on Earth. By studying the sun, researchers can better predict and prepare for space weather, which is largely cause by solar flares and coronal mass ejections. These events can impact our planet by interfering with radio signals and causing other problems with technology on Earth, if they're strong enough.

In this latest image, two sets of wavelengths at 171 and 193 Angstroms are blended together. These were colorized in gold and yellow in order to create a particularly Halloween-like appearance.

For more information about NASA's SDO, you can visit their website here.