As of June 17, 2010, the solar barycenter remains near the solar surface.  The solar barycenter is the center of gravity for all the planets and the Sun.  The barycenter interacts directly with the Sun's core.  The core of the Sun is dense and thus moves somewhat independent of the upper layers.  Usually, the solar barycenter causes the core to jiggle within the Sun, which causes familiar solar activity seen in the 1900s.

At this time, the solar barycenter is transiting the Sun's surface in a tighter formation than it has in over 6000 years; even more so than prior to the Maunder Minimum in the 1600s.  This is a significant solar event.

This is a survivable event, to be sure.  It happens regularly in cosmic time.  However, a barycenter transit over the Sun's surface for such a long time will significantly cool the Sun.  In the next 150 years, future solar barycenter transits will slow down the recovery of the present quiet period.  As a result, we are likely to experience about 150 years of solar minimum punctuated by a few false starts.  This will translate to about 150 years of cool weather on Earth before solar activity returns to the level seen in the 1900s.

Below is the solar barycenter path since 2002 until present:

Current technology allows scientists to view smaller sunspots than scientists in the 1600s could see.  Due to the present system of cataloging sunspot numbers, three tiny and barely perceptible sunspots can result a sunspot number from 40 to 60, depending upon the judgment of the few people issuing this number.  The sunspot number is in no way an actual count of sunspots.  The present formula was put into place at a time when it was very difficult to see sunspots and has not been updated to reflect technological advances.

In December 2009, the new GOES 14 satellite was put into operation.  The long wave x-ray radiation index suddenly was magnified by a factor of 10.  Since then, C class solar flares are now being called M class flares.

The launch of new high resolution cameras into space for observing the Sun yield fantastic and highly detailed images.  The introduction of high resolution images enables scientists to see features which were always there, but beyond our ability to see.  The excitement of these new images gives the appearance of lots new solar activity.

In reality, considering our new technologies, the actual behavior of the Sun is even less interesting than solar behavior during the Maunder Minimum, when no (or very few) sunspots were recorded for many years.

The only mechanism causing sunspots at this time are supernova explosions.  When a star explodes, it sends a magnetic shock wave (also coincident with a gravitational wave) across the Universe.  Following this shock wave is a bright burst of gamma ray light called a gamma ray burst (GRB).  GRBs nearly always follow a certain pattern of solar x-ray spikes as seen in the image at the right.  The spikes on May 4 and 5 were coincident with GRB 100504A on May 4, 2010.

Once the gamma ray bursts have passed, the Sun usually quiets right down.  However, if there have been a series of GRBs, the Sun may remain active for a couple weeks or so before quieting down again.

The present solar barycenter is located near the Sun's surface.  However, the barycenter is now taking a path a little deeper into the center of the Sun.  Around 2012 we should be experiencing peak quietude in the Sun's core.  It will take a lot of energy to get the core's momentum back into swing.  We cannot expect to see that momentum build up until well after 2018 as seen in the image below:

NASA is expecting a major pent up release of solar radiation between now and 2013.  If this does materialize, it will not be due to the normal magnetic activity we have witnessed in the 1900s.  Instead, any large explosions are likely to be caused by the production of long filaments, which collapse to the Sun's surface and explode.  NASA calls them Hyder flares.  Hyder flares have the potential to be thousands of times more powerful than an X class solar flare and they are longer lived.