Bright Points on the Quiet Sun

Up close, the solar surface is a striking patch work of granules in this very high
resolution picture of the quiet Sun. Caused by convection, the granules are hot,
rising columns of plasma edged by dark lanes of cooler, descending plasma. But
the high-resolution view reveals that the dark lanes are dotted with many small,
contrasting bright points. Constantly present on the solar surface, the bright points
do not seem to be related to sunspots that come and go with the magnetic solar cycle.
Nonetheless, the bright points are regions of concentrated magnetic fields and are
bright because the magnetic pressure opens a window to hotter deeper layers below
the photosphere. The sharp, narrow-band image was recorded in September, 2007
using the Swedish Solar Telescope on the astronomical island of La Palma.