From the earliest times mankind appreciated the important role of this star - the bright disk in the sky, carrying the light and warmth. In many prehistoric and ancient cultures the sun was worshiped as a deity. The Cult of the Sun occupied an important place in the religions of civilizations of Egypt, the Incas, and Aztecs. Many ancient monuments are connected with the Sun: for example, megaliths, accurately mark the position of summer solstice sun. Astronomy in fact came to us from the early centuries. Chinese astronomers, for centuries known since the Han dynasty, observed sunspots. For the first time the spots were sketched in 1128 in the chronicle of John of Worcester. era of instrumental studies of the sun begins with 1610. The invention of the telescope and its special varieties for observing the Sun - helioscope allowed Galileo, Thomas Herriotu, Christoph Scheiner, and other scientists consider the sun spots. The Earth's atmosphere prevents the passage of many types of electromagnetic radiation from space.

Moreover, even in the visible spectrum, for which the atmosphere is fairly transparent, the images of space objects may be distorted, its fluctuations, so observations of these objects to produce better at high altitudes (in the astronomical stations, with instruments, raised in theupper layers atmosphere,and so etc.) or even from space, using the oso. If want to get a very clear image of the sun, explore its ultraviolet or X-rays, to accurately measure the solar constant, the observation and recording is carried out with balloons, rockets, satellites and space stations. For effective monitoring of the Sun, there are special, so-called solar telescopes are installed at many stations around the world. Observations of the Sun have the peculiarity that the brightness of the sun is high and hence aperture solar telescopes may be small. Much more important to get as much zoom, and to achieve this solar telescopes have very large focal lengths (tens of meters and meters).