Spoiler alert: Computer simulations provide preview of next week's eclipse

(University of Texas at Austin, Texas Advanced Computing Center) Researchers from Predictive Science Inc. used NASA and National Science Foundation-supported supercomputers to run highly-detailed forecasts of the Sun's corona -- the aura of plasma that surrounds the sun -- at the moment of the eclipse. The team combined data from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory, magnetic field maps, solar rotation rates and cutting-edge mathematical models to predict the state of the Sun's surface. The si