保护地球，探索宇宙，发现文明
A sounding rocket launched from Poker Flat Research Range in Fairbanks, Alaska, Nov. 8, 2023, carrying NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center’s DISSIPATION mission. The rocket launched into aurora and successfully captured data to understand how auroras heat the atmosphere and cause high-altitude winds. The teams continue to support a second sounding rocket laun...
2023年11月6日 Red Aurora over Italy Image Credit & Copyright: Giorgia Hofer Explanation: What was that red glow on the horizon last night? Aurora. Our unusually active Sun produced a surface explosion a few days ago that sent out a burst of electrons, protons, and more massive charged nuclei. This coronal mass ejection (CME) triggered auroras here on Earth...
2023年11月5日 Creature Aurora Over Norway Image Credit & Copyright: Ole C. Salomonsen (Arctic Light Photo) Explanation: It was Halloween and the sky looked like a creature. Exactly which creature, the astrophotographer was unsure (but possibly you can suggest one). Exactly what caused this eerie apparition in 2013 was sure: one of the best auroral displays...
2023年10月22日 Ghost Aurora over Canada Image Credit & Copyright: Yuichi Takasaka, TWAN Explanation: What does this aurora look like to you? While braving the cold to watch the skies above northern Canada early one morning in 2013, a most unusual aurora appeared. The aurora definitely appeared to be shaped like something, but what? Two ghostly possibilitie...
2023年8月15日 A Triply Glowing Night Sky over Iceland Credit & Copyright: Wioleta Gorecka; Text: Natalia Lewandowska (SUNY Oswego) Explanation: The Sun is not the quiet place it seems. It expels an unsteady stream of energetic electrons and protons known as the solar wind. These charged particles deform the Earth’s magnetosphere, change paths, and co...
2023年7月30日 Spiral Aurora over Icelandic Divide Image Credit & Copyright: Juan Carlos Casado (Starry Earth, TWAN) Explanation: Admire the beauty but fear the beast. The beauty is the aurora overhead, here taking the form of a great green spiral, seen between picturesque clouds with the bright Moon to the side and stars in the background. The beast is the...
2023年7月4日 Aurora over Icelandic Waterfall Image Credit & Copyright: Cari Letelier Explanation: It seemed like the sky exploded. The original idea was to photograph an aurora over a waterfall. After waiting for hours under opaque clouds, though, hope was running out. Others left. Then, unexpectedly, the clouds moved away. Suddenly, particles from a large...
2023年7月2日 Milky Way and Aurora over Antarctica Image Credit & Copyright: LI Hang Explanation: It was one of the better skies of this long night. In parts of Antarctica, not only is it winter, but the Sun can spend weeks below the horizon. At China‘s Zhongshan Station, people sometimes venture out into the cold to photograph a spectacular night sky...
2023年4月25日 Northern Lights over Southern Europe Image Credit & Copyright: Lorenzo Cordero Explanation: Did you see an aurora over the past two nights? Many people who don’t live in Earth’s far north did. Reports of aurora came in not only from northern locales in the USA as Alaska, but as far south as Texas and Arizona. A huge auroral oval e...
2023年4月19日 Auroral Storm over Lapland Image Credit & Copyright: Juan Carlos Casado (Starry Earth, TWAN) Explanation: On some nights the sky is the best show in town. On this night, auroras ruled the sky, and the geomagnetic storm that created this colorful sky show originated from an increasingly active Sun. Surprisingly, since the approaching solar CME...