(Image source: NASA)

BY STEVEN SPARKMAN

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For all the skywatching humanity has done in its day, there’s a lot about the sun we still don’t understand. But two new breakthroughs are helping scientists predict the sun’s most violent activities, like coronal mass ejections.

It starts with sunspots -- areas on the sun with very active magnetic lines. These lines can sometimes break, and the sunspot can send a trillion tons of charged gas spewing toward the Earth. (Video source: NASA / Discover Magazine)

That’s -- the coronal mass ejection, or CME. CMEs are the biggest hazards space weather can produce. National Geographic explains.

“As these particles interact with our magnetic field, they create geomagnetic storms that can pose hazards to astronauts and spacecraft in orbit as well as to power grids and telecommunications equipment on the ground. Knowing when and where sunspots … will form may therefore be key to predicting solar storms.”

The first big breakthrough -- scientists can predict where sunspots will form -- by listening for them. A writer for Cosmos gives a brief summary.

“The analysis technique is known as time-distance helioseismology, and is similar to an approach widely used in earthquake studies. … The researchers found that when the acoustic waves encounter a sunspot on their path between the two points ... it will speed up...”

Once the technique is polished, it will allow scientists to predict sunspots up to two days in advance. And another breakthrough study picks up where the sun-listeners leave off -- the moment those sunspots pass their ionized gas our way.

Until now, scientists weren’t able to track a CME after it left the sun, leaving them to guess exactly when and how it would affect Earth. But NASA says they’re now able to tease out the faint light of the charged gasses over the entire trip, using new image processing techniques.

“By applying this new technology, scientists were able to measure the absolute brightness of detailed features in the first large, Earth-directed CMEs seen by STEREO … For the first time ever, scientists can watch a CME from its formation on the sun to its impact with Earth’s magnetosphere...”

Taken together, the new techniques give scientists new tools to protect airlines, power grids, and every one and every thing floating around in space. Or as the Christian Science Monitor puts it:

“Between the two projects, the teams have developed tools to track some of the most severe types of space weather from gestation within the sun to delivery at Earth's doorstep.”

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Transcript by Newsy.