Space weather as a research area investigates the variable conditions in space driven primarily by solar activity and their impact on the heliosphere, near-Earth environment, and technological systems. It encompasses the study of the solar magnetic field, flares, coronal mass ejections, high-speed solar wind streams, and energetic particles, and how these phenomena interact with planetary magnetospheres, ionospheres, and upper atmospheres. Research integrates observations, theory, and physics-based modeling to understand and predict geomagnetic storms, radiation belt dynamics, ionospheric disturbances, and associated hazards to satellites, communication and navigation systems, power grids, and human spaceflight.
Northern lights may be visible in parts of the U.S. Monday night following weekend solar storms.
Planetary Sciences
Jun 2, 2025
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An international team of scientists has discovered an extreme spike in radiocarbon corresponding to the year 12350 BC during the dusk of the last Ice Age. However, the strength of the event could not be assessed earlier because ...
Planetary Sciences
May 15, 2025
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On March 15, 2024, near the peak of the current solar cycle, the sun produced a solar flare and an accompanying coronal mass ejection (CME), a massive explosion of gas and magnetic energy that carries with it large amounts ...
Planetary Sciences
May 14, 2025
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103
We tend to think of habitability in terms of individual planets and their potential to host life. But barring outliers like rogue planets with internal heating or icy moons with subsurface oceans created by tidal heating, ...
Planetary Sciences
May 12, 2025
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44
Near real-time preliminary data from NOAA's first Compact Coronagraph (CCOR-1), a powerful solar telescope onboard the GOES-19 satellite, are now publicly accessible. GOES-19, launched in June 2024, began providing the new ...
Astronomy
Mar 28, 2025
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73
When the sun hurled enormous amounts of radiation into space in an explosive eruption on February 22, 2024, the Indian space probe Aditya-L1, launched a few months earlier, was watching closely—and thus captured the first ...
Astronomy
Feb 28, 2025
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61
High above Earth's poles, intense electrical currents called electrojets flow through the upper atmosphere when auroras glow in the sky. These auroral electrojets push about a million amps of electrical charge around the ...
Planetary Sciences
Feb 25, 2025
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There are trillions of charged particles—protons and electrons, the basic building blocks of matter—whizzing around above your head at any given time. These high-energy particles, which can travel at close to the speed of ...
Planetary Sciences
Feb 5, 2025
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39
Researchers have created an improved traffic light system for predicting geomagnetic storms. They are now testing how well these algorithms can prepare us for incoming space storms that can wreak havoc by knocking out satellites ...
Astronomy
Jan 24, 2025
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58
A team led by researchers at the University of Tokyo has created a dataset of the whole atmosphere, enabling new research to be conducted on previously difficult-to-study regions. The work has been published in Progress in ...
Planetary Sciences
Jan 10, 2025
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