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Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research

The research focus of the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research is our cosmic neighborhood: the solar system with its planets and moons, comets and asteroids as well as the sun. The aim of the scientists is to describe the processes in the solar system in models and to simulate them on the computer. In addition, instruments are being developed and built to study these bodies from space. The Institute is involved in numerous space missions.

Computer simulation of a solar prominence

Solar Prominences: Supply Mechanisms in the Sun’s Corona

Prominences are cool plasma structures extending several thousand kilometers in the Sun’s hot corona. Some persist for weeks. For prominences to form and remain stable, they need a constant replenishment of plasma. A new study in the journal Nature Astronomy provides insights into their “supply logistics.” For the first time, the new computer simulations take into account processes in all involved layers of the Sun - including those below the surface.

High Honor for Lakshmi Pradeep Chitta

The Solar Physics Division (SPD) of the American Astronomical Society (AAS) has awarded this year's Karen Harvey Prize to MPS researcher Dr. Lakshmi Pradeep Chitta. In his research, Chitta studies the corona, the Sun’s hot atmosphere. This is where the solar wind and solar flares originate. His findings have transformed our understanding of the Sun. They demonstrate how tiny magnetic structures and processes determine the dynamic nature of the corona.

Six apprentices with a model of a Mars rover

A Mars Rover for MPS

Three years before “Rosalind Franklin” is scheduled to land on Mars, MPS trainees have completed their own model of the Mars rover. From the initial idea to the finished model, every step of the process was handled by the twelve young craftsmen from the precision mechanics workshop, the metalworking shop, and the computer center.

Magnetic Avalanche on the Sun

At the end of 2024, ESA’s Solar Orbiter was lucky to witness a strong solar flare – and observed the events leading up to this firework with unprecedented precision. A new analysis of these data has now been published.
Apparently, small restructuring processes in the Sun's magnetic field build up like an avalanche – and then discharge explosively.

Research Departments

Sun and Heliosphere

The focus of this department is the solar interior, the solar atmosphere, the solar magnetic field, the heliosphere, and the interplanetary medium, as well as solar radiation and solar energetic particles. The balloon-mission Sunrise, a balloon-borne solar observatory, is managed by this department. The mission investigates our central star from a height of about 35 km. In addition to several other participations in space missions, the department significantly contributes to the ESA's Solar Orbiter.

Planetary Science

This department investigates the interior, the surfaces, atmospheres, ionospheres, and magnetospheres of planets and their moons, as well as comets and asteroids. The department currently contributes or has contributed to important space missions such as the ESA's missions JUICE to the Jovian system, BepiColombo to Mercury and Rosetta to comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko as well as NASA's missions InSight to Mars and Dawn to the asteroid belt.

Solar and Stellar Interiors

Helioseismology and asteroseismology are tools that use the oscillations of the Sun and stars to probe their interior structure and dynamics. This allows us to test and refine the theory of stellar structure and evolution, thereby bringing us closer to understanding solar and stellar magnetism. The department hosts the German Data Center for NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory, and is preparing to host the data center of ESA's exoplanet hunting mission, PLATO.

further Research Groups