New experiments have shown the source of the aurora borealis. Researchers have demonstrated Alfvén waves accelerating electrons under conditions that correspond to Earth’s magnetosphere. The ...

This is a representation of the three-dimensional magnetic field (due to four currents threading the center of each helix) of a shear Alfvén wave. It was acquired at an instant of time throughout the ...

The aurora borealis, or northern lights, that fill the sky in high-latitude regions have fascinated people for thousands of years. But how they’re created, while theorized, had not been conclusively ...

Researchers have achieved a breakthrough in solar physics by providing the first direct evidence of small-scale torsional Alfven waves in the Sun's corona - elusive magnetic waves that scientists have ...

The Nature Index 2025 Research Leaders — previously known as Annual Tables — reveal the leading institutions and countries/territories in the natural and health sciences, according to their output in ...

Researchers have made a significant advancement in understanding the underlying heating mechanism of the sun's atmosphere, finding that reflected plasma waves could drive the heating of coronal holes.

Why the sun's corona reaches temperatures of several million degrees Celsius is one of the great mysteries of solar physics. A 'hot' trail to explain this effect leads to a region of the solar ...

Most recent heater-based studies of magnetospheric processes and ionosphere-thermosphere-magnetosphere (ITM) system couplings use the “virtual antenna” concept, which allows generation and injection ...

For decades, astrophysicists have puzzled over why the sun’s corona—its outermost atmosphere—burns at millions of degrees while the surface remains comparatively cool. Now, a new study published in ...