AURORA

Aurora

An aurora is a natural light display in the sky particularly in the high latitude regions, caused by the collision of energetic charged particles with atoms in the high altitude atmosphere . The charged particles originate in the magnetosphere and solar wind and, on Earth, are directed by the Earth's magnetic field into the atmosphere. Most aurorae occur in a band known as the auroral zone, which is typically in 3° to 6° latitudinal extent of geographical poles, or equivalently, 10° to 20° latitudinal extent of geomagnetic poles, and at all local times or longitudes. During a geomagnetic storm, the auroral zone expands to lower latitudes.

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aurora

Noun

  1. An atmospheric phenomenon created by charged particles from the sun striking the upper atmosphere, creating coloured lights in the sky. It is usually named australis or borealis based on whether it is in the southern or northern hemispheres respectively.


The above text is a snippet from Wiktionary: aurora
and as such is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

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