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Solar Wind Moves at 1 Million MPH And We Now Have An(other) Idea on How It Gets Going

Although it may not seem like it, space has its own weather. It doesn’t consist of rain, hurricanes, or snow, but it does have wind, and lots of it.
Although it's been with us forever, the Sun still is a mysterious place 32 photos
Photo: NASA Goddard
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We call the phenomenon solar wind, and it’s nothing more than a constant stream of charged particles (electrons, protons, and heavier ions) shooting outward from the Sun and into the solar system. We have known of it since the 1850s, when British astronomer Richard Carrington first observed it. Here on Earth, we’ve witnessed its effects in the atmosphere since forever, in the form of auroras, and more recently in the form of the problems it causes with our GPS and communication systems.

According to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), solar wind travels through space at speeds that reach one million miles per hour (1.6 million kph), and it does so in an even manner. By the time it reaches Earth though, it slows down to “a breeze,” as NASA says. Yet two questions remain: how is solar wind formed, and how does it accelerate to such speeds?

Until now, the majority of scientists explained solar wind as being generated by “the outward expansion of plasma […] from the Sun's corona,” but that doesn’t explain all that much because the specifics are not known. Others point to solar flares and coronal mass ejections as being responsible, but given how these don’t take place on a constant basis, it’s unlikely that’s so.

Back in 2018, NASA launched the Parker Solar Probe, a mission to study the Sun from a very close perspective. Sure, it came into the spotlight mostly because it became the fastest spacecraft humans ever launched (it reached 430,000 mph/700,000 kph at the closest approach), but the things it observed since its departure are beginning to yield results.

Scientists looking at Parker data (but also from other sources) say they’ve “uncovered significant new clues about the origins of the solar wind,” and those origins could be the phenomena called jetlets that manifest themselves at the base of the corona.

Described as small-scale jets (just hundreds of miles long, and that’s tiny compared to the size of the Sun) of million-degree plasma, these things have been observed all over the Sun’s corona, and are now considered prime suspects in the generation of solar wind.

The finding is surprising because although solar wind is constant (meaning it does not happen in bursts), jetlets take place intermittently. Yet, there are so many of them that their effects accumulate as they move away from the Sun to become one smooth stream of wind. Kind of like individual clapping sounds inside an auditorium become a constant roar, as Craig DeForest, solar physicist at the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado, says.

DeForest is co-author of a paper on the subject published by the Cornell University, while study lead is Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory’s Nour Raouafi. Hopes are the findings included in the paper will not only help us better understand the nature of solar wind, but also how it gets heated up and accelerated.

For us regular Joes it may not seem that important to know these things (except if they directly impact our ability to move about and talk to one another), but you have to keep in mind given enough time, solar wind has the ability to erode and change planetary atmospheres even to a degree that they might become unhospitable to life as we know it.

The jetlets theory is not yet proven, and further research into their role in wind generation is required.
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Editor's note: Gallery shows Parker Solar Probe images.

About the author: Daniel Patrascu
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Daniel loves writing (or so he claims), and he uses this skill to offer readers a "behind the scenes" look at the automotive industry. He also enjoys talking about space exploration and robots, because in his view the only way forward for humanity is away from this planet, in metal bodies.
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