Arsenal won last time out, we are in the quarter finals of the Europa league, which is the 2nd tier of European football. Not like I care about Arsenal though, my profile still states that I'm a former arsenal fan (☺ ☺).
I want to appreciate everyone that dropped by to give a comment on my previous post. I'm saying a big thank you for the kind words. I hope to see you again on this one.
Today, I want to delight you with the science behind the beautiful yet mysterious Aurora Borealis or simply known as the northern lights. When Steem price was high, I was thinking about vacation destinations around the world, I saw great places. But one particularly caught my attention, Norway. Which is said to be the best place to see the northern lights. I'd just seen the northern lights on TV, it was a beautiful spectacle of ethereal light shimmering across the sky. The scientist in me got curious as to what causes these lights and how exactly does it happen. Well, I found out and you are about to too. Take a front row sit and get your bucket of popcorn.
Random fact about Auroras
All Northern Lights have separate pattern and also different colors. No one has seen two matching ones.
What are Aurora Borealis
Auroras were thought to be the first light of the morning. Auroras often referred to as northern lights, polar light or even southern lights are natural lights beaming upon the night skies. Mostly seen in places within the high latitude region.
History of Auroras
Over the years, the light as been a great source of speculation and myth. Paintings in caves of France which are said to be over 30,000 years have illustrations of this lights.
In the medieval times, the aurora lights were thought to be an omen of war and destruction as nobody had the knowledge about the causes of these lights.
Around 1616, Galelio Galilei described them as Aurora Borealis, combining the names of Roman goddess of dawn (Aurora) and the Greek name for wind (Boreas).
What causes Auroras
The sun is 90 million miles away, yet it's influence extends far beyond it's evident surface. Big storm on the sun send flurry of charged solar particles flying across space.
When the earth is in the way of the charged particles, the earth's magnetic field and the atmosphere interact. As the particles nears earth, it distorts the earth's magnetic field and allows some of these particles to make way into the earth's atmosphere at the magnetic north and south pole.
When these particles from the sun collide with the atoms and molecules of earth's atmosphere, they excite those atoms thereby causing them to glow up.
An atom consist of a nucleus and seas of electrons swarming round it in an orbit. Once, the charged particles from the sun hits the atoms in the earth's atmosphere, then electrons gain enough energy to move into higher energy orbit further away from the nucleus. When electrons move back to lower-enegry orbits, it releases a photons (particles of light). This process creates the alluring aurora.
The magnetic and electrical forces react in a constantly moving combination. This moves and flow are seen as auroras shimmer along the atmosphere with atmospheric currents up to 20 million amperes and 50,000 volts. ( FYI, the circuit breaker in homes trip off when current flow are just over 15 - 30 amperes and 150 volts).
This occurence is similar to what happens in neon signs. Electricity excites the atoms in the neon gas encompassed in the glass tube of a neon sign. That's why those signs show off radiant colours. The principles are the same, just that the Aurora is on a much larger scale.
What causes the colours
The northern lights are seen in different colors from pink, blue, green, yellow, violet and sometimes orange and white. Majorly, when the particles collide with oxygen, that's when yellow and green lights are produced. While collision with nitrogen brings about red and violet and sometimes blue lights.
Type of collision and altitude of collision also play a part in what color appears in the sky. For example, when green lights are produced when collision occurs at around 150 miles, blue up to 60 miles. And also if the collision occurs with atomic nitrogen blue lights are seen while collision with molecular nitrogen brings about purple lights.
This lights may display as fixed band of lights or as a dancing screen of alternating colors when solar flares are strong.
Conclusion
The best time to see these lights is during winter due to the less pollution of lights around this time. As mentioned earlier, Norway, Finland and Sweden offers cool viewpoint to see these alluring lights.
If you're ever chanced to see the northern lights, I hope you will be able to explain to the Wall Street guy standing next to you who kept wondering how this lights come about that it's just solar flares colliding with atoms in the sky.
References
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