Space weather refers to the time-varying conditions in near-Earth space and throughout the heliosphere driven primarily by solar activity, including the solar wind, coronal mass ejections (CMEs), solar flares, and variations in the interplanetary magnetic field. As a physical phenomenon, it encompasses the coupling of solar outputs with Earth’s magnetosphere, ionosphere, and thermosphere, producing geomagnetic storms, substorms, ionospheric disturbances, and energetic particle events. These processes are governed by magnetohydrodynamic and plasma-physical interactions, including magnetic reconnection, wave–particle interactions, and particle acceleration, and are quantitatively characterized using indices such as Kp, Dst, AE, and measures of solar wind and IMF parameters.
The Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland, recently released the results of the nation's first end-to-end Space Weather Tabletop Exercise (TTX), held in May 2024. The After-Action Report, published ...
Planetary Sciences
May 5, 2025
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The NASA/ESA Solar Orbiter recently recorded the highest-ever concentration of a rare helium isotope (3He) emitted from the sun. A Southwest Research Institute-led team of scientists sought the source of this unusual occurrence ...
Astronomy
Apr 9, 2025
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For some Dallas-area scientists, the total solar eclipse on April 8, 2024, was more than just a once-in-a-lifetime cosmic spectacle: It was a rare and invaluable research opportunity, the perfect controlled experiment.
Astronomy
Apr 8, 2025
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What are the dangers of going to space?
Space Exploration
Apr 3, 2025
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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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Under the nighttime California sky, NASA's EZIE (Electrojet Zeeman Imaging Explorer) mission launched aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket at 11:43 p.m. PDT on March 14.
Planetary Sciences
Mar 17, 2025
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Dust and rocks residing on the surface of the moon take a beating in space. Without a protective magnetosphere and atmosphere like Earth's, the lunar surface faces continual particle bombardment from solar wind, cosmic rays, ...
Space Exploration
Mar 5, 2025
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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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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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The sun periodically ejects huge bubbles of plasma from its surface that contain an intense magnetic field. These events are called coronal mass ejections, or CMEs. When two of these ejections collide, they can generate powerful ...
Astronomy
Feb 24, 2025
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