The Gifted Four were happily on board Orak’s Tempus Machine. They were traveling far, far away from Earth. “What’s the surprise?” Scorch asked. “Today we are going to see the Sun smiling,” Orak replied and he pulled out four pairs of glasses from his backpack.
“How can that big light ball smile,” Felix asked with his eyes wide in wonder, “Who did it smile at?”
“At NASA!” giggled Orak.
“The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is a space agency of the United States (US). It conducts space research,” Verum added joyfully.
“Yes. One of its missions is called the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) mission. The SDO spacecraft was launched in 2010 and it has been studying the Sun since then. It captured an image of the Sun last month,” Orak said.
“And, was the Sun really smiling?” said Scorch, scratching her chin in doubt.
“The Sun’s surface is hotter in some places and cooler in other places. This creates hot and cool patches all across its surface. When seen in ultraviolet light (UV), the cooler patches appear dark.
These dark patches created the look of a smile. A young astronomer came across these patches and shared the picture with humans.
Come, put the glasses on and look at the Sun, we are almost there!” Orak said with excitement.
The Gifted Four adorned the glasses and smiled in awe at two dark dots which looked like eyes and a dark curve that looked like a smile. “The Sun is smiling at us,” giggled Felix and Scorch laughed in awe.