* Astronomy

Here's a strange scenario: You move farther away from a fire, getting cooler and cooler, until suddenly you are burning up.
That's essentially what happens in the sun: Its outer layer, the corona, is inexplicably hot. A new study may complicate things further by poking holes in a leading theory that aims to account for the puzzling phenomenon.
Last year, astrophysicist Steve Tomczyk of the National Centre for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo., and his colleagues asserted that corkscrew-shaped Alfven waves were converting the motion energy of the sun's roiling material into heat.

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