Knowledge Base

Answers and Guides

How Are Solar Images and Heliospheric Data Visualized for Observation?

Solar images and heliospheric data are visualized by loading near-real-time and archival observations from multiple spacecraft in…

What Is the Sun and How Can You View Live Solar Images?

The Sun is the star at the center of our solar system, a ball of plasma held together by gravity that produces energy through nuc…

What Is JP2 (JPEG 2000) and Why Is It Used for Scientific Images Like Solar Data?

JP2 is the file extension for images encoded with JPEG 2000, a compression standard built on wavelet transforms rather than the d…

What Is JPEG 2000 and How Is It Different from Standard JPEG?

JPEG 2000 is a wavelet-based image format standardized in 2000 as ISO/IEC 15444. It differs from standard JPEG (the 1992 DCT-base…

What Is Helioviewer and How Do You Use It to View the Sun?

Helioviewer is a browser-based solar and heliospheric image visualization tool that lets you browse Sun imagery from multiple dat…

How to View and Convert RAW Camera Files to JPEG or PNG in Your Browser

Raw.pics.io is a browser-based RAW viewer and converter that opens CR2 (Canon), NEF (Nikon), ARW (Sony), ORF (Olympus), PEF (Pent…

What Is a Coronagraph and How Does It Reveal Exoplanets and Faint Objects?

A coronagraph is an instrument that blocks a star's light so fainter objects near it become visible. It works by placing an occul…

What Is SpaceEngine and What Can You Explore in Its Virtual Universe?

SpaceEngine is a realistic virtual universe simulator you run on your computer. It is built for people who want to travel through…

What Is Cytoscape and What Can You Do With It?

Cytoscape is an open-source software platform for visualizing and analyzing complex networks, and it is most widely used for biol…

What Is Astronomy and How Do You Read Astronomy Research News?

Astronomy is the scientific study of celestial objects, space, and the physical universe as a whole — planets, stars, galaxies, b…