Credit: ESA/NASA– T. Pesquet
Auroras produce excellent Halloween decoration over Earth, though ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet snapped these green smoky swirls of plasma from the International Space Station in August. Visualized are the Soyuz MS-18 “Yuri Gagarin” (left) and the brand-new Nauka module (right).
The Station saw rather some aurora activity that month, triggered by solar particles hitting Earths atmosphere and producing a spectacular light show.
Quick forward to October and area is quite hectic.
On 9 October the Sun ejected a violent mass of fast-moving plasma into area that got to Earth a few days later on. The coronal mass ejection (CME) crashed into our planets magnetosphere and as soon as again illuminated the sky.
CMEs blow up from the Sun, rush through the Solar System and while doing so accelerate the solar wind– a stream of charged particles continuously launched from the Suns upper atmosphere.
While the majority of the solar wind is blocked by Earths protective magnetosphere, some charged particles end up being trapped in Earths electromagnetic field and stream down to the geomagnetic poles, clashing with the upper atmosphere to create the stunning Aurora.
While the view outside the Space Station is enchanting, the astronauts inside are busy with science and prepping for the next teams arrival later on this month..
Thomas will invite fellow ESA astronaut Matthias Maurer, currently arranged to introduce to the Space Station on Halloween.
In the meantime, Thomas has taken over command of the Space Station and is busy finishing more science ahead of completion of objective Alpha and his go back to Earth.
The astronauts have used up space farming recently, tending to New Mexico Hatch Green Chili peppers in the name of science. A few examinations are looking into various elements of plant habits in microgravity.
Tending to the body by means of exercise is likewise standard practice on the Space Station. The crew carried out cycles of experiments looking into immersive workout practices as well as the familiar Grasp experiment on reflexes under microgravity conditions.
Even downtime is ripe for experimentation, with Thomas wearing a headset to bed to track quality of sleep under weightless conditions. Learn more about the goings-on in the latest monthly science recap.