Solar wind Solar wind The solar wind is a stream of charged particles released from the upper atmosphere of the Sun, called the corona. This plasma consists of mostly electrons, protons and alpha particles with kinetic energy between 0.5 and 10 keV. Embedded within the solar-wind plasma is the interplanetary magnetic field. The solar wind varies in density, temperature and speed over time and over solar latitude and longitude. Its particles can escape the Sun's gravity because of their high energy resulting from the high temperature of the corona, which in turn is a result of the coronal magnetic field. At a
Plasma modeling Plasma modeling Plasma Modeling refers to solving equations of motion that describe the state of a plasma. It is generally coupled with Maxwell's Equations for electromagnetic fields or Poisson's Equation for electrostatic fields. There are several main types of plasma models: single particle, kinetic, fluid, hybrid kinetic/fluid, gyrokinetic and as system of many particles. The single particle model describes the plasma as individual electrons and ions moving in imposed (rather than self-consistent) electric and magnetic fields. The motion of each particle is thus described by the Lorentz Force Law. In many cases of practical interest, this motion can be treated