This photo shows the aurora borealis (Northern Lights). The picture was taken in Alaska in 2001.
Click on image for full size
Image courtesy of Jan Curtis.
The Aurora
The aurora is also known as the northern and southern lights. They are called northern lights if they are seen in the northern hemisphere and southern lights if they are seen in the southern hemisphere.
The auroral lights often appear towards the poles of the Earth. So in the northern hemisphere, aurora is seen most often around Alaska, Norway, and the Northwest Territories. But sometimes the aurora can be seen as far south as Michigan, New York and Oregon. Have you ever seen the aurora?
The aurora is formed when particles from the Sun enter the Earth's atmosphere. This causes the atmosphere to light up. We see these lights and call them aurora.
You might also be interested in:
Dangerous particles from the Sun don't hit the Earth's surface. They are forced by the Earth's magnetic field to move around the Earth. You can think of the Earth's magnetic field as a big shield from
...more
Have you ever seen the Southern or Northern Lights? Did you know that other planets (besides Earth) have them too? Scientists call these cosmic light shows the "aurora". Saturn is one of the planets that
...more
The Earth has a magnetic field with north and south poles. The magnetic field of the Earth is surrounded by the magnetosphere. The magnetosphere keeps most of the particles from the sun, carried in solar
...more
For a planet to be affected by a blob of material being ejected by the sun, the planet must be in the path of the blob, as shown in this picture. The Earth and its magnetosphere are shown in the bottom
...more
Besides the beautiful aurora at the north and south poles, the magnetosphere generates lots of noisy radio signals. These signals tell us that something is happening within the magnetosphere, such as particles
...more
Did you know that the Sun can affect the Earth? It can! During a time called solar maximum, the Sun is really active. That means it spits out lots of material. Some of it passes the Earth and can cause
...more
Did you know that the Earth has a magnetic field? It's almost as if a giant bar magnet ran through our planet. The magnetic field of the Earth is like a huge bubble around our planet. This bubble keeps
...more
