The mysteries of solar prominences—massive plasma structures floating above the Sun’s surface like gravity-defying ships, which can cause dangerous solar eruptions—are finally revealed in new research from Germany’s Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research (MPS).
These massive solar structures can stretch for thousands of kilometers, appearing like flickering flames, yet at only around 10,000 degrees. This leaves them much cooler than the million-degree corona that surrounds them, while being close to 100 times denser.
Now, in a new paper published in Nature Astronomy, researchers examine these enormous solar features and their potential to erupt in events that can pose serious dangers to Earth.
Solar Prominences Float Above the Surface
“Solar prominences are cool and dynamic plasma clouds hovering in the hot solar atmosphere,” lead author Dr. Lisa-Marie Zessner explained to The Debrief. “They can be found all over the sun and can have very different shapes, sizes, and lifetimes. The heavy prominence plasma is supported against gravity by magnetic fields.”
“The density of the prominence material is typically two orders of magnitude higher than the density of the surrounding corona,” Zessner continued. “A comparison to the typical density ratio might be a piece of wood (a bit dependent on the type of wood), so we could, for example, say that this is roughly like if a wooden ship were floating in Earth’s atmosphere (at least close to ground level).”
The Danger of Solar Prominences
These swathes of matter held aloft above the solar surface are potential ticking time bombs. They can often remain stable for weeks or even months before either fading into oblivion or exploding, at which point they drive charged solar particles into space.
The latter possibility presents a major potential concern for us on Earth. Earth’s electrical and communications infrastructure may be protected to some degree by the planet’s atmosphere, but extreme solar events can still pass through, potentially severely impacting our ground-based systems.
Additionally, as more and more communications and crucial GPS capabilities are placed on orbital satellites, those systems are even more vulnerable to space weather impacts. Understanding violent space events, such as solar prominences, is essential to accurately predict space weather and mitigate threats to our infrastructure.
“To protect Earth’s infrastructure in time, reliable forecasts of dangerous space weather are needed. A deeper understanding of prominences is a crucial piece of the puzzle,” said co-author Sami K. Solanki, Director of the “Sun and Heliosphere” Department at MPS.
The Life of a Solar Prominence
A major feature of the new work is the identification of the processes that balance a solar prominence as it gains and loses mass. The researchers developed complex simulations of interactions between the solar plasma and the magnetic field. Never before had researchers examined how the Sun’s deeper, cooler layers may be influencing solar prominences.
“In the Sun’s atmosphere, the magnetic field is the driving force,” Zessner said. “It also plays a decisive role in all processes that contribute to the formation and maintenance of the prominences.”
The change in temperature across the sun’s layers also influences solar prominences: the chromosphere, the lower portion of the atmosphere, reaches 20,000 degrees, while the surface reaches only 6,000 degrees.
The team’s simulation assumed that solar prominences tend to form at the dip between two magnetic field arches and revealed that turbulent, small-scale magnetic field movements pushed plasma out in bursts, which became trapped in the dip. Once the prominence forms, it is caught between steady plasma loss in the form of rain on the solar surface and further bursts that add to its mass, potentially influencing or triggering an eruption.
“Our calculations show, more realistically than ever before, how both processes interact to supply the prominences with material and thus keep them alive,” Zessner explained.
Earlier work modeling these provinces showed how the prominences condensed, but overlooked how they were supplied with plasma over time. This new work provides essential information for understanding how they may erupt or dissipate, which can be used to improve potentially catastrophe-averting space weather models.
The paper, “Self-Consistent Numerical Simulations for the Formation and Dynamics of Solar Prominences,” appeared in Nature Astronomy on April 23, 2026.
Ryan Whalen covers science and technology for The Debrief. He holds an MA in History and a Master of Library and Information Science with a certificate in Data Science. He can be contacted at ryan@thedebrief.org, and follow him on Twitter @mdntwvlf.