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COST296/IHY outreach activities Lucilla
Alfonsi(1) Giorgiana De Franceschi(1), David
Altadill(2), Pal Bencze(3), Alain Bourdillon(4),
Ljiljana R. Cander(5), Benito de la Morena(6),
Lefteris Economou(7), Miguel Herraiz(8), Kirsti
Kauristie(9), Jan Lastovicka(10), Silvia Pau(1),
Gracia Rodriguez(8), Richard Stamper(5), Iwona
Stanislawska(11) (1)Istituto Nazionale di
Geofisica e Vulcanologia - Rome, Italy (2)
Observatorio del Ebro (3) Geodetic and
Geophysical Institute - Hungarian Academy of
Sciences (4) Institut dElectronic et de
Telecommunications de Rennes (5) Rutherford
Appleton Laboratory, Council for the Central
Laboratory of the Research Councils (6) Instituto
Nacional de Tecnica Aerospacial (7) Intercollege
Limassol Campus (8) Universidad Complutense
Madrid (9) Finnish Meteorological Institute (10)
Institute of Atmospheric Physics (11) Space
Research Center
2nd European General Assembly of
the International Heliophysical Year  Turin, June
18-22, 2007
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The COST296/IHY web site structure is hosted at
INGV and it is reachable also through the menu of
the COST296 official site. http//ionos.ingv.it/I
HY/ihy_index.html
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Realization of the European COST296 - IHY 
calendar Coordinated by INGV
The competition for the European kids drawings
(6-11 years old) has been launched on March 2007.
The best drawings will be published on the COST
296/IHY calendar. The launch has been made in
the frame of different outreach activities
(seminars, conferences, exhibitions, etc)
organized at national level in 8 different
Countries Cyprus, Czech Republic, Finland,
France, Italy, Poland, Spain, UK. To stimulate
the fantasy of the pupils and to take the
opportunity of education on Sun and Sun-Earth
connections, some cards on specific items have
been produced and provided to the teachers.
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European competition addressed to primary school
students (6-11 years) to create the
school-calendar 2007 - 2008. Do you like to
draw? Would you like to see your drawing
published on the school-calendar? Then enter the
competition to create the school calendar
2007-2008 promoted by the National Institute of
Geophysics and Volcanology (INGV-Italy) and by
the COST296 action! How to participate. You just
need paper, a paint box, and your imagination.
The Sun shines upon our days, every day. Do we
know it really? What is its history? How does the
Sun act on our life? The enclosed forms will help
you to learn more about our star. Rule The
competition is aimed at European primary school
students (6-11 years). Drawings should be sent no
later than May 14 2007 to Richard
Stamper Rutherford Appleton Laboratory Chilton Did
cot Oxfordshire, OX11 0QX Drawings should be in
A4 format on a white paper. On the back please
write in capitals - First name and family name
of the student - Class-room - School address -
First name and family name of the
teacher. Please note drawings should arrive
whole damaged drawings cannot be used in the
calendar. A national committee will select
drawings on the basis of originality, spontaneity
and drawing autonomy. The selected drawings will
be published in the school-calendar
2007/2008. Please note drawings will not be
returned. INGV and COST296 action could use the
drawings for their outreach initiatives. Students
and schools participating in the competition
will receive copies of the calendar 2007/2008.
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In the Universe there are many stars, but the Sun
is the closest to the Earth and to the other
planets of the Solar System that spin around it.
The Sun was born around 5 billion years ago and
is made essentially of two gases hydrogen and
helium. Our star could be thought of as divided
into different zones, one inside another. In the
middle is the Core, an enormous nuclear power
station, where the hydrogen becomes helium
producing large amounts of energy, this is why
the Sun is so bright! The energy produced in the
Core then crosses the Radiative Zone, reaching
the Convective layer, where the energy is
transported by gases towards the surface which
then return to the interior as they cool. Going
towards the surface there is the Photosphere,
then the edge between the internal part and the
external one, known as Chromosphere. Finally, the
Corona is the most external part of the Sun,
extending for millions of kilometres and with a
highly variable shape. The size of the Sun is
about 100 times greater than the size of the
Earth the diameter of the Earth is about 13000
km, the diameter of the Sun is about 1350000
km. The Sun is very far from the Earth, about 150
million of km, but we are now able to observe the
Sun in detail. From these observations we have
learnt that the Sun does not behave always in the
same way sometimes it is more active and
sometimes it is more quiet. Scientists have found
that on the surface of the Sun there are little
dark spots, named pores, and visible near the
edge are hotter spots, named faculae. On the
disk there are dark regions the sunspots as
observed originally by Galileo, where the
magnetic field of the Sun is stronger and the
temperature is lower than the average. Sunspots
can appear alone or in groups, but roughly every
11 years a maximum in the number of sunspots is
observed (active Sun). During solar minimum
periods sunspots are very few or absent (quiet
Sun). When the sun is active there are lots of
protuberances, huge and brilliant jets of plasma,
which thanks to the magnetic field of the Sun,
leave the chromosphere and then the corona
forming streams extending for thousands of km
from the Suns surface. When the Sun is strongly
active the solar storms happen.
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The Sun is so bright because it is very hot its
temperature on the surface is about 6000C, while
in the inner part, the core, it reaches about 15
million C. To understand how high these
temperatures are consider that the melting point
of iron is only 1500C. These high temperatures
mean a huge amount of energy transmitted by the
Sun towards outer Space not only as light but
also as a wind, called the Solar Wind. This wind
is composed of protons and electrons travelling
with a speed between 300 to 2000 kilometres per
second in this way the energy emitted by the Sun
travels like a rocket able to reach 7 million
kilometres per hour! Consider that the maximum
velocity reached by a Ferrari during a race is
just 350 kilometres per hour! Part of the energy
transported by the solar wind reaches also the
Earth, but a protecting shield, the
Magnetosphere, keeps the solar wind out from the
atmosphere. It works like an obstacle in a river,
where the water (the solar wind) is forced to go
round it. The magnetosphere is the part of space
where the magnetic field of the Earth acts. You
make use of this magnetic field when you use a
compass to find which direction is North. Without
our magnetic field the solar wind would sweep
away our atmosphere.
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Our protecting shield, the Magnetosphere, has two
weak points. Near the North and South poles the
solar wind can enter the Earths atmosphere with
all its energy. When the amount of the energy is
high in particular when a solar storm happens
the components of the atmosphere are modified,
causing the aurorae. The aurorae make the polar
sky blue, green or red, depending on how much
energy arrives and on which gases are hit. The
occurrence of the aurorae indicates that the Sun
is strongly active. It is unusual to see an
aurora at middle latitudes, but when the Sun is
particularly active the aurorae can be seen in
regions far from the poles.
These phenomena are part of what is called Space
Weather. Instead of forecasting the temperature
and whether it will rain, space weather
fore-casters try to predict when there will be a
solar storm and if it will cause an aurora. The
aurorae are beautiful to see but the conditions
that cause them can lead to many problems
aeroplanes may have to divert away from the
poles, satellites can stop working,
comm-unication links may be interrupted and,
sometimes the electricity grid can be damaged.
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During daytime the Sun can be darkened for a few
minutes. This happens during a solar eclipse,
when the Sun, the Earth and the Moon are
perfectly aligned and the Moon hides the Sun.
Due to a curious coincidence the Sun and Moon,
although of extremely different real dimensions
(the diameter of the Sun is about 400 times
greater that the diameter of the Moon), seen from
the Earth have the same apparent dimensions
because the Sun is also 400 times more distant
than the Moon from the Earth. Imagining a giant
screen behind the Moon, an umbra would be
projected on the screen surrounded by a penumbra.
During a solar eclipse the screen is the Earth
on its surface appear regions of umbra, from
which a total eclipse is observed, and regions of
penumbra from which is visible a partial eclipse.
When the Sun, the Earth and the Moon are
perfectly aligned the Moon can also be hidden. A
lunar eclipse happens when the Earth is between
Sun and Moon, projecting its shadow on the Moon.
Do not watch the Sun with the naked eye without
any protection!
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The heat of the Sun is the engine of the winds
and ocean circulation. Without the Sun life on
the Earth would be impossible. Our atmosphere
is, luckily, also able to keep a great portion of
the heat re-emitted by the ground when heated by
the Sun. This is known as the greenhouse effect,
because it is similar to what happens in a
greenhouse for growing crops. The greenhouse
effect is often mentioned with a negative
connotation, but it is a natural process that
keeps our planet at an average temperature above
the freezing point of water. Without the
greenhouse effect the average temperature of the
Earth would be 20C below zero! Such a
temperature would not allow any form of life on
our planet. Human activity is leading to an
increase in the atmospheric gases trap the heat,
enhancing the natural greenhouse effect and
amplifying the heating of the Earths surface.
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The project of the Calendar is now
accomplished It will host 3 drawings every two
months for each Country, covering 16 months (from
September 2007 to December 2008). The
Coordination team has received more than 1200
drawings from all over Europe! Among these only
25 have been selected. On September 20, the
Calendar will be officially presented with the
proclamation of the winners in Rome (INGV
Conference Hall).
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News and plans

• The Coordination team is evaluating the
  possibility to invite the winners to attend the
  Celebration day on September 20. Any suggestion
  to look for funds?
• The Calendar will be produced and delivered to
  the participating Nations. Moreover the pdf file
  of the Calendar will be uploaded on the
  COST296/IHY web site (resources).

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