Let's start from something we all know and agree about: Earth's place in the solar system. Starting before history was written down, humans undoubtedly scratched images of the stars and ‘wandering stars’ – the planets – in the sand: the earliest attempts to understand and predict the future, or, the beginning of science.

Our understanding of Earth's place among the planets and stars was, for centuries, based on the obvious fact that we are the center of the universe. Plato's model of heavenly spheres, and the notion of heaven itself, became an article of faith.

Earth (Terra) at the center before 1596

early rendering of Kepler’s heliocentric model

Johannes Kepler proposed the revolutionary idea that the planets, including Earth, orbit the Sun. With Tycho Brahe's precise data and discovery that planets move in ellipses rather than circles, Kepler mapped the true heliocentric solar system in something approaching our current understanding in 1609

We may also agree that our relationship to our Sun is the Earth's  single most important fact. Sunspot’s whole mission is to help us acquire a clearer and more comprehensive understanding of this fact.

In pursuit of the science, we are not alone: in the last half century, the level and intensity of scientific inquiry about the Sun and light has exploded, and imagery has become the principal way of explaining as well as the primary source of scientific advancement. 

From the summit of Hawaii's Haleakala Observatory, the Inouye Solar Observatory is the main earth-bound site for solar exploration. The best solar viewing is possible from that height because the air is clear and minimally obscured by nearby cities.

Even better, space telescopes have allowed increasingly high resolution and varied spectra unavaliable inside the Earth’s atmosphere.

By 2020, space and imaging technology improved to the point where the European Space Agency was able to place a satellite that approaches the blazing star within a mere 42 million kilometers, where the equipment needed to operate despite the temperature in excess of 500°C.