Aurora Borealis: What is it and where does it come from?

The Sun is amazing thing, the light and the heat from the Sun keep us alive. The sun also makes things in our planet survive, it makes the spring, winter, fall, come and go like clock work. It also gives us another kind of light that is called the “Aurora Borealis” also known as the Northern Lights.

But the Northern Lights are not “lights” it is actually a bubble filled with a billion tons of plasma and glowing gas that was ejected by a magnetic rubber band in the center of the sun. The bubble travels towards the earth at a speed of up to eight million KM/H and it reaches the Earth in about 15 hours.

Today’s video OTD at the bottom explains how particles originating from deep inside the core of the sun creates northern lights. It has a very cool animation to simplify the whole process. You can also see what happens when the bubble of glowing gas hits the magnetic field around the Earth. The short animations also explain what causes the sun to glow, how magnetic fields on the sun arch over until they break like a rubberband, how the magnetic field of Earth protects us from dangerous radiation and why the Northern Lights glow: Enjoy!

Also, you can see an extended multimedia version of this video at forskning.no you’ll have to use a translator since it’s only in Norwegian: