NASA IBEX: Interstellar winds buffeting our solar system have shifted direction

This image shows the nearest interstellar gas clouds around the solar system, including the Local Interstellar Cloud (LIC) and G Cloud, along with positions of neighboring stars in the plane of our Milky Way galaxy. 

The arrow shows the sun's motion relative to neighboring stars. 

Image courtesy of P.C. Frisch, University of Chicago

Scientists, including University of New Hampshire astrophysicists involved in NASA's Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) mission, have discovered that the particles streaming into the solar system from interstellar space have likely changed direction over the last 40 years.

The finding helps scientists map our location within the Milky Way galaxy and is crucial for understanding our place in the cosmos through the vast sweep of time—where we've come from, where we're currently located, and where we're going in our journey through the galaxy.

Additionally, scientists now gain deeper insight into the dynamic nature of the interstellar winds, which has major implications on the size, structure, and nature of our sun's heliosphere—the gigantic bubble that surrounds our solar system and helps shield us from dangerous incoming galactic radiation.

The results, based on data spanning four decades from 11 different spacecraft, including IBEX, were published in the journal Science September 5, 2013.

Eberhard Möbius

"It was very surprising to find that changes in the interstellar flow show up on such short time scales because interstellar clouds are astronomically large," says Eberhard Möbius, UNH principal scientist for the IBEX mission and co-author on the Science paper.

Adds Möbius, "However, this finding may teach us about the dynamics at the edges of these clouds—while clouds in the sky may drift along slowly, the edges often are quite fuzzy and dynamic. What we see could be the expression of such behaviour."

The data from the IBEX spacecraft show that neutral interstellar atoms are flowing into the solar system from a different direction than previously observed.

Interstellar atoms flow past the Earth as the interstellar cloud surrounding the solar system passes the sun at 23 kilometers per second (50,000 miles per hour).

The various sets of observations relied on three different methods to measure the incoming interstellar wind. IBEX and Ulysses directly measured neutral helium atoms as they coursed through the inner solar system.

IBEX's measurements are close to Earth, while Ulysses' measurements were taken between 1.3 and 2 times further from the sun.

Nathan Schwadron

In the final analysis, the direction of the wind obtained most recently by IBEX data differs from the direction obtained from the earlier measurements, which strongly suggests the wind itself has changed over time.

"Prior to this study, we were struggling to understand why our current measurements from IBEX differed from those of the past," says co-author Nathan Schwadron, lead scientist for the IBEX Science Operations Center at UNH.

"We are finally able to resolve why these fundamental measurements have been changing with time: we are moving through a changing interstellar medium."

More information: "Decades-Long Changes of the Interstellar Wind Through Our Solar System," by P.C. Frisch et al Science, 2013.

Coronal Mass Ejection (CME) From the Sun Directed at Earth

Early on March 17, 2013, the coronal mass ejection (CME) from March 15 interacted with the giant magnetic bubble surrounding Earth, the magnetosphere, causing a G1-class geomagnetic storm. Storms of this strength have caused auroras near the poles but have not disrupted electrical systems on Earth or interfered with GPS or satellite-based communications systems. Credit: NASA.

On March 15, 2013, at 2:54 a.m. EDT, the sun erupted with an Earth-directed coronal mass ejection (CME), a solar phenomenon that can send billions of tons of solar particles into space and can reach Earth one to three days later and affect electronic systems in satellites and on the ground.

Experimental NASA research models, based on observations from the Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO) and ESA/NASA's Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, show that the CME left the sun at speeds of around 900 miles per second, which is a fairly fast speed for CMEs.

Historically, CMEs at this speed have caused mild to moderate effects at Earth.

The NASA research models also show that the CME may pass by the Spitzer and Messenger spacecraft. NASA has notified their mission operators.

There is, however, only minor particle radiation associated with this event, which is what would normally concern operators of interplanetary spacecraft since the particles can trip on board computer electronics.

Not to be confused with a solar flare, a CME is a solar phenomenon that can send solar particles into space and reach Earth one to three days later.

Earth-directed CMEs can cause a space weather phenomenon called a geomagnetic storm, which occurs when they connect with the outside of the Earth's magnetic envelope, the magnetosphere, for an extended period of time.

In the past, geomagnetic storms caused by CMEs such as this one have usually been of mild to medium strength.