What are the bright, irregularly shaped patches within the Sun's granular photosphere texture specifically called?
Answer
Convection cells
The granular texture visible on the Sun's photosphere is composed of discrete structures identified as convection cells. These cells are the visible manifestation of the convective heat transfer process occurring beneath the surface. In each cell, extremely hot material originates from below, rises to the visible surface, spreads out across the top of the cell, loses some of its heat to space, and subsequently sinks back down into the stellar interior along the darker, cooler lanes that separate adjacent convection cells. These features are the primary mechanism responsible for transporting energy outward in stars like our Sun.
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