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Schematic of the Birkeland or Field-Aligned Currents and the ionospheric current systems they connect to, Pedersen and Hall currents. [1]A Birkeland current (also known as field-aligned current, FAC) is a set of electrical currents that flow along geomagnetic field lines connecting the Earth's magnetosphere to the Earth's high latitude ionosphere.
The magnetosphere is defined by the extent of Earth's magnetic field in space or geospace. It extends above the ionosphere , several tens of thousands of kilometres into space , protecting Earth from the charged particles of the solar wind and cosmic rays that would otherwise strip away the upper atmosphere, including the ozone layer that ...
The ring current system consists of a band, at a distance of 3 to 8 R E, [1] which lies in the equatorial plane and circulates clockwise around the Earth (when viewed from the north). The particles of this region produce a magnetic field in opposition to the Earth's magnetic field and so an Earthly observer would observe a decrease in the ...
The magnetosphere of Jupiter is the largest planetary magnetosphere in the Solar System, extending up to 7,000,000 kilometers (4,300,000 mi) on the dayside and almost to the orbit of Saturn on the nightside. [17] Jupiter's magnetosphere is stronger than Earth's by an order of magnitude, and its magnetic moment is approximately 18,000 times ...
The heliospheric current sheet rotates along with the Sun with a period of about 25 days, during which time the peaks and troughs of the skirt pass through the Earth's magnetosphere, interacting with it. Near the surface of the Sun, the magnetic field produced by the radial electric current in the sheet is of the order of 5 × 10 −6 T. [2]
Since 1997, the solar magnetic field has been monitored in real time by the Advanced Composition Explorer (ACE) satellite located in a halo orbit at the Sun–Earth Lagrange Point L1; since July 2016, it has been monitored by the Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR) satellite, also at the Sun–Earth L1 (with the ACE continuing to serve as a ...
The current density J is itself the result of the magnetic field according to Ohm's law. Again, due to matter motion and current flow, this is not necessarily the field at the same place and time. However these relations can still be used to deduce orders of magnitude of the quantities in question.
The magnetosphere is roughly shaped like a hemisphere on the side facing the Sun, then is drawn out in a long wake on the opposite side. The boundary of this region is called the magnetopause, and some of the particles are able to penetrate the magnetosphere through this region by partial reconnection of the magnetic field lines. [31]