New article: Large scale planetary waves discovered on the sun read more at here http://www.spinonews.com/index.php/science/item/3130-large-scale-planetary-waves-discovered-on-the-sun

Scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research have discovered Rossby waves on the sun. The large-scale planetary waves were first discovered on Earth.

On Earth, Rossby waves are correlated with local weather events. On the sun, scientists suggest the waves could influence solar activity and related phenomena, like sunspots and solar flares.

Rossby wave patterns are unique to rotating fluids, like the atmosphere and the ocean. The sun's upper layers are mostly plasma and rotate. Scientists have previously hypothesized that the sun could host Rossby waves, but observing wave patterns on the sun is difficult.

Researchers are able to pick out wave patterns on earth using dozens of satellites and instruments, which observe physical phenomena from a variety of vantage points.

Recently, a trio of satellites and spacecraft offered astronomers varied solar perspectives. Researchers supplemented data collected by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory, a probe circling halfway between the sun and Earth, with observation from a pair of satellites with NASA's Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory mission.

Dean Pesnell, SDO project scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, explained, by combining the data from all three satellites we can see the entire sun and that's important for studies like this because you want the measurements to all be at the same time. They're pushing the boundary of how we use solar data to understand the interior of the sun and where the magnetic field of the sun comes from.

In tracing the movements of coronal bright points on the sun's surface, researchers identified cohesive bands of magnetized activity, Rossby-like waves moving across the solar surface.

Scientists believe the waves could be linked with the 11-year solar cycle, as well as solar phenomena like coronal mass ejections and solar flares.

Researchers said, it's possible that it's all tied together, but we needed to have a global perspective to see that. We believe that people have been observing the impacts of these Rossby-like waves for decades, but haven't been able to put the whole picture together.

More information: [Nature Astronomy]