The Northern lights, how and why? Bashny.Net

Northern lights — mysterious, unpredictable and beautiful phenomenon, suddenly appearing and just as suddenly disappearing. This glow of the upper atmosphere of the planet has a magnetosphere due to their interaction with charged particles of the solar wind. Northern lights is a stunning beauty, a breathtaking spectacle.


It can last from several hours to several days. The answer to the question, what is it, first found the Mikhail Lomonosov. After countless experiments, he suggested about the electrical nature of this phenomenon. Scientists continue to study this phenomenon on the basis of the experiments confirm the correctness of his hypothesis.


So, the Northern lights arise from bombardment of the upper atmosphere with charged particles moving towards the Earth along the lines of the geomagnetic field from the field of near-earth space, called plasma layer. Projection plasma layer along the geomagnetic field lines on the earth's atmosphere is in the form of rings surrounding the North and South magnetic poles (auroral ovals).


Identifying the reasons leading to the eruption of charged particles from the plasma layer, has been involved in space physics. The most impressive Northern lights appear every 11 years and 22 years, it depends on solar activity. Thanks to satellite footage confirmed the old theory that auroras in the Northern and southern hemispheres represent nearly mirror each other is a ring with a diameter of about 4 thousand km around each field.




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