 EPOD - a service of USRA

The Earth Science Picture of the Day (EPOD) highlights the diverse processes
and phenomena which shape our planet and our lives. EPOD will collect and
archive photos, imagery, graphics, and artwork with short explanatory
captions and links exemplifying features within the Earth system. The
community is invited to contribute digital imagery, short captions and
relevant links.


 Einstein's Eclipse, Colorized

   April 05, 2021

    1919_05_29_TSE_Eddington_Soft_SCAN_light_det_FINAL_1500px
   Image Creator: ESO/Landessternwarte Heidelberg-Königstuhl/F. W. Dyson,
   A. S. Eddington, & C. Davidson, P. Horálek/Institute of Physics in
   Opava, M. Druckmüller
   Summary Author:  Petr Horálek

   The  total solar eclipse shown above was observed on  May 29,
   1919, from Sobral, Brazil. Using a digital scan of this eclipse from
   one copy of a photographic plate, part of the  Heidelberg Digitized
   Astronomical Plates (HDAP) project funded by the  Klaus Tschira
   Foundation, it was possible to reconstruct the  solar corona and
   also structures of the huge  prominence of this scientifically
   important eclipse that helped confirm  Einstein’s General
   relativity. In order to so, however, we needed to separate real details
   from scratches and dust on the scan and focus on sub-threshold
   information hidden in a high dynamic range of the original photograph.
   Since the eclipse was photographed on a  classical photographic
   plate and the scan was saved in high quality, it was possible to apply
   basic postprocessing methods, which are nowadays used for digital
   photography, and also apply special  Noise Adaptive Fuzzy
   Equalization software developed by  Professor Miloslav Druckmüller.
   Despite very inhomogeneous exposure of the plate and non-perfect
   removal of artifacts, fine details in the solar corona of the 1919
   eclipse have been preserved and revealed.
   The most notable feature is the huge  prominence located close to
   the  equatorial area of the Sun -- the largest prominence ever
   captured during a total solar eclipse. Also of note are structures
   typical of the uneven  solar magnetic field. When such structures
   became more obvious, by defining the basic colors of known phenomena in
   the image (prominence, solar corona), it was then possible to colorize
   the final result and thus for the first time show this famous eclipse
   in a way never seen before.
     * Sobral, Brazil Coordinates:  -3.6895, -40.3486

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    More...

Sun Links

     *  NASA Solar Dynamics Observatory
     *  NASA Solar Eclipse Page
     *  NOAA Solar Calculator
     *  The Sun-Earth Connection: Heliophysics
     *  The Sunspot Cycle
     *  Solar System Exploration: The Sun
     *  The Sun Now
     *  This Week’s Sky

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   Earth Science Picture of the Day is a service of the  Universities
   Space Research Association.

https://epod.usra.edu
 
