High above Earth, thin veils of metallic haze drift through the edge of space. Known as sporadic E layers, these high-altitude “clouds” form from the vaporized dust of burnt-up meteors, earning their name from the unpredictable way they emerge and then dissipate. Now, new results from a NASA sounding rocket — a suborbital research rocket
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At the center of our solar system, the Sun influences every planet that orbits it. In two recent NASA-funded studies, scientists uncovered how ancient events in the Sun’s history may have helped create Earth’s unique climate and driven previously unexplained climatic shifts. In new research, scientists at NASA’s SHIELD (Solar Wind with Hydrogen Ion charge Exchange and Large-Scale Dynamics) center — one of
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As humanity looks to the Moon and stars for future exploration, predicting space weather — conditions in space primarily driven by the Sun — is more important than ever. Now, a team of astrophysicists and data scientists with NASA’s COFFIES (Consequence Of Fields and Flows in the Interior and Exterior of the Sun) has developed a
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Using continuous imagery from NASA’s PUNCH (Polarimeter to Unify the Corona and Heliosphere) mission, scientists predicted the near-Earth arrival of a solar eruption to within 30 minutes in an initial proof of concept test. The results, presented Tuesday at the Committee on Space Research Scientific Meeting and under review at the journal Space Weather, could
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On July 3, one of NASA’s two Mars-bound ESCAPADE (Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorers) spacecraft captured photographs of the Earth and Moon in visible and thermal infrared light. At the time, the spacecraft was 584,600 kilometers (363,250 mi) from Earth and 186,100 kilometers (115,600 mi) from the Moon, making the Moon appear relatively
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Patches of the Sun’s surface often show strong magnetic fields. These fields can emerge within a matter of hours, and can decay slowly or quickly, sometimes over days, weeks, or even months. Thanks to a new study about these long-lived active regions, we now know much more about the patches where these strong magnetic fields
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