The solar wind bubble that protects the earth has been mapped for the first time

In 2009, using NASA’s Starbreaker, Also known as the IBEX, astronomers saw a strange ribbon-shaped structure dancing between our solar system and the rest of the space between the stars.

The discovery of the IBEX tape, which is invisible to both telescopes and the human eye, was one of the first attempts by scientists to understand more about our heliosphere – a shield shaped like a bubble made of solar wind.

New research Published in the Astrophysical Journal the entire boundary of this shield is mapped, and the collected data can be used to open a new era. heliophysics exploration.

“Most instruments that perceive particles in space detect charged particles,” he says Daniel Reisenfeld, Chief scientist and lead author of research at the New Los Los National Laboratory in Mexico. But the IBEX is unique.

It detects neutral energy atoms, or ENAs, by neutralizing ions that originally come out of the sun but collide with electrons between stars. These atoms can be found everywhere in space, and observing ENA flows over time can be a powerful imaging tool.

So what exactly was that mysterious tape? Scientists have since determined that what they were seeing was a huge set of ENAs that illuminate the night sky.

The only 11-year solar cycle, the time between changes in the solar magnetic field, using IBEX data collected in ENEX, the researchers built a three-dimensional map of the entire heliosphere, and Reisenfeld says it protects Earth and other planets from harmful radiation. .

“Our Earth is bombarded by cosmic rays, galactic cosmic rays all the time,” he says. These rays can subtly affect aircraft flying near the poles, often on trips between Europe or Asia and the US.

Scientists say that to study the astrospheres of other planets, that is, when the so-called heliospheres orbit other stars, we must first understand our own.

“Many of the physical models that are being developed right now are based on the findings of the IBEX mission,” he says Nikolai Pogorelov, professor of space sciences at the University of Alabama at Huntsville. “It’s not just experimental,” he says, “he added that it will be used for that [a] the real purpose “.