The Earth has a magnetic field very much like that of a bar magnet, directed from the geographic South pole to geographic North pole. Charged particles streaming outward from the Sun arrive in the Earth's vicinity. read more
Before we can understand auroras, we need a few facts about the space around our Earth. There are many things in this space that we can't see. One thing is the air we breathe, our atmosphere. It is really a mixture of several gases, mostly nitrogen and oxygen, with traces of hydrogen, helium and various compounds. read more