NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array or NuSTAR has taken its first X-ray photo of the Sun.

According to NASA, the Sun's image is the "most sensitive solar portrait ever taken in high-energy X-rays."

NASA said the first image covers the so-called west limb of the Sun. The Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) caught the image and it's ready to make it wallpaper-ready for people's devices.

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"NuSTAR will give us a unique look at the sun, from the deepest to the highest parts of its atmosphere," said David Smith, a solar physicist and member of the NuSTAR team at University of California, Santa Cruz.

Smith convinced Fiona Harrison of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena that NuStar can be used to see the X-ray flashes predicted by theorists.

Now, NuStar confirms it can really collect data about the Sun and offer insights into questions regarding the exceptionally high temperatures found above sunspots (cool, dark patches on the Sun).

The Sun's first X-ray image shows high-energy X-rays not visible to the naked eye. The X-rays come from gas heated to above three million degrees Celsius. The non-red bits seen in the image are lower-temperature material in the solar atmosphere with a temperature closer to one million degrees Celsius.

NuStar can even take photos of nanoflares, smaller versions of the Sun's giant flares that erupt with charged particles and high-energy radiation. If NuStar could take images of nanoflares in action, these photos may finally solve this decades-old mystery about nanoflares.

TagsNASA, NuStar, Sun's first image, nanoflares, Sunspot, high-energy X-rays, Sun's X-ray