aurora
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posted by catherine / November 11, 2004 / 
via becca i see that the post had quite a cool gallery of the aurora borealis that showed up in the upper midwest on monday. i mention it 1) because the photos are astonishingly beautiful and 2) because it reminds me to remind you yet again that you should read the his dark materials trilogy by philip pullman, which feature the northern lights prominently (in the UK, the first book is actually titled the northern lights, though it's called the golden compass in the US).
can anyone explain to me how this phenomenon works? i read it in the trilogies, and i guess i could look it up online, but i'm lazy.
from the wapo.com
Comments
My understanding is that the earth's magnetic field diverts all the solar particles constantly being thrown at us from the sun into a sort of funnel near the north and south poles. There they get sufficiently dense that they shoot out visible light as they collide with the atmosphere.
But I could be pretty wrong about that. Anyone else care to take a shot?
That's my take too, but instead of density I thought that angle of entry or what have you caused the effect (sort of like the colors of sunset)? Where's the Internet when you need it?
it'd be more fun and easier to understand if you could just say, like, "faeries!"
You guys are all way off. The answer is nanotechnology.
Jeff, I would suddenly like to invest money in this aurora venture of yours.
There is entirely too much irrational exuberation over auroras.
http://www.geo.mtu.edu/weather/aurora/
Holy crap, if you think they look cool from the ground, see what they look like from space:
http://www.geo.mtu.edu/weather/aurora/images/space/
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