Curated category
Space plasmas
- LightningA bolt of cloud-to-ground lightning strikes the Mediterranean Sea off of Port-la-Nouvelle in southern France. This specific event illustrates one of three…
- Solar windIn 1859, British astronomer Richard C. Carrington watched a sudden flash of brightness on the solar disc that would later be known as a solar flare.
- SunThe Sun formed about 4.6 billion years ago from the collapse of part of a giant molecular cloud that consisted mostly of hydrogen and helium.
- Interstellar mediumThe space between stars is not empty. It holds matter and radiation that astronomers call the interstellar medium. This substance includes gas in ionic…
- Outer spaceThe baseline temperature of outer space, as set by the background radiation from the Big Bang, is 2.725 kelvins. This near-perfect vacuum contains ultra-low…
- Van Allen radiation beltIn early 1958, the Explorer 1 satellite sent back data that changed our understanding of space. James Van Allen from the University of Iowa published an…