The strange relationship between the Earth and the Sun
ScienceNow: Every few minutes, short-lived portals open on the dayside of Earth's magnetic field, new satellite observations reveal. During that time, Earth and the sun are locked in a magnetic tangle that could trigger the geomagnetic storms that occasionally bedevil satellite communications and electrical power systems on the ground.
Comments
This is indeed an interesting phenomenon. The study of Flux Transfer Events are on the cutting edge of classical electrodynamics.
It is interesting to note that we do not even have to go as far as quantum-electrodynamics, electroweak unification, and the like to study fundamental behaviors of electromagnetic or electrodynamic fields.
I have for a long time been fascinated with novel aspects or new discoveries with respect to the topology of magnetic fields, electrical fields, and electromagnetic fields, especially those on the scale of the Earth's magneto-sphere and that of the solar system.
Perhaps FTE have their analogue in the vacinity of supermassive blackholes with accretion disks, the extremely high intensity of the magnetic fields around highly magnetized neutron stars (as high as about 10 EXP 12 Tesla,)and perhaps within and on the scale of entire galaxies.
Posted by: James M. Essig | November 10, 2008 4:46 PM