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Fermi Glow
The Fermi glow consists of ultraviolet-glowing particles, mostly hydrogen, originating from the Solar System's bow shock, created when light from stars and the Sun enter the region between the heliopause and the interstellar mediumA Glowing Discovery at the Forefront of Our Plunge Through Space
". . 15 March 2000.
and undergo Fermi acceleration, bouncing around the transition area several times, gaining energy via collisions with atoms of the interstellar medium. The first evidence of the Fermi glow, and hence th ...
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Science Magazine
''Science'' is the peer-reviewed academic journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and one of the world's top academic journals. It was first published in 1880, is currently circulated weekly and has a subscriber base of around 130,000. Because institutional subscriptions and online access serve a larger audience, its estimated readership is over 400,000 people. ''Science'' is based in Washington, D.C., United States, with a second office in Cambridge, UK. Contents The major focus of the journal is publishing important original scientific research and research reviews, but ''Science'' also publishes science-related news, opinions on science policy and other matters of interest to scientists and others who are concerned with the wide implications of science and technology. Unlike most scientific journals, which focus on a specific field, ''Science'' and its rival ''Nature'' cover the full range of scientific disciplines. According to the ''J ...
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Termination Shock
The heliosphere is the magnetosphere, astrosphere, and outermost atmospheric layer of the Sun. It takes the shape of a vast, tailed bubble-like region of space. In plasma physics terms, it is the cavity formed by the Sun in the surrounding interstellar medium. The "bubble" of the heliosphere is continuously "inflated" by plasma originating from the Sun, known as the solar wind. Outside the heliosphere, this solar plasma gives way to the interstellar plasma permeating the Milky Way. As part of the interplanetary magnetic field, the heliosphere shields the Solar System from significant amounts of cosmic ionizing radiation; uncharged gamma rays are, however, not affected. Its name was likely coined by Alexander J. Dessler, who is credited with the first use of the word in the scientific literature in 1967. The scientific study of the heliosphere is heliophysics, which includes space weather and space climate. Flowing unimpeded through the Solar System for billions of kilomete ...
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Heliosphere
The heliosphere is the magnetosphere, astrosphere, and outermost atmospheric layer of the Sun. It takes the shape of a vast, tailed bubble-like region of space. In plasma physics terms, it is the cavity formed by the Sun in the surrounding interstellar medium. The "bubble" of the heliosphere is continuously "inflated" by plasma originating from the Sun, known as the solar wind. Outside the heliosphere, this solar plasma gives way to the interstellar plasma permeating the Milky Way. As part of the interplanetary magnetic field, the heliosphere shields the Solar System from significant amounts of cosmic ionizing radiation; uncharged gamma rays are, however, not affected. Its name was likely coined by Alexander J. Dessler, who is credited with the first use of the word in the scientific literature in 1967. The scientific study of the heliosphere is heliophysics, which includes space weather and space climate. Flowing unimpeded through the Solar System for billions of kilo ...
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Voyager 2
''Voyager 2'' is a space probe launched by NASA on August 20, 1977, as a part of the Voyager program. It was launched on a trajectory towards the gas giants (Jupiter and Saturn) and enabled further encounters with the ice giants (Uranus and Neptune). The only spacecraft to have visited either of the ice giant planets, it was the List of artificial objects leaving the Solar System, third of five spacecraft to achieve Solar escape velocity, which allowed it to leave the Solar System#Farthest regions, Solar System. Launched 16 days before its twin ''Voyager 1'', the primary mission of the spacecraft was to study the outer planets and its extended mission is to study interstellar space beyond the Sun's heliosphere. ''Voyager 2'' successfully fulfilled its primary mission of visiting the Exploration of Jupiter, Jovian system in 1979, the Exploration of Saturn, Saturnian system in 1981, Exploration of Uranus, Uranian system in 1986, and the Exploration of Neptune, Neptunian system ...
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Interstellar Boundary Explorer
Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX or Explorer 91 or SMEX-10) is a NASA satellite in Earth orbit that uses energetic neutral atoms (ENAs) to image the interaction region between the Solar System and Outer space, interstellar space. The mission is part of NASA's Small Explorer program and was launched with a Pegasus (rocket), Pegasus-XL launch vehicle on 19 October 2008. The mission is led by Dr. David J. McComas (IBEX principal investigator), formerly of the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) and now with Princeton University. The Los Alamos National Laboratory and the Lockheed Martin Advanced Technology Center built the IBEX-Hi and IBEX-Lo sensors respectively. The Orbital Sciences Corporation manufactured the satellite bus and was the location for spacecraft environmental testing. The nominal mission baseline duration was two years after commissioning, and the prime ended in early 2011. The spacecraft and sensors are still healthy and the mission is continuing in its exten ...
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Hubble Space Telescope
The Hubble Space Telescope (HST or Hubble) is a space telescope that was launched into low Earth orbit in 1990 and remains in operation. It was not the Orbiting Solar Observatory, first space telescope, but it is one of the largest and most versatile, renowned as a vital research tool and as a public relations boon for astronomy. The Hubble Space Telescope is named after astronomer Edwin Hubble and is one of NASA's Great Observatories program, Great Observatories. The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) selects Hubble's targets and processes the resulting data, while the Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) controls the spacecraft. Hubble features a mirror, and its five main instruments observe in the ultraviolet, visible spectrum, visible, and near-infrared regions of the electromagnetic spectrum. Hubble's orbit outside the distortion of atmosphere of Earth, Earth's atmosphere allows it to capture extremely high-resolution images with substantially lower background lig ...
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Voyager 1
''Voyager 1'' is a space probe launched by NASA on September 5, 1977, as part of the Voyager program to study the outer Solar System and the interstellar medium, interstellar space beyond the Sun's heliosphere. It was launched 16 days after its twin, ''Voyager 2''. It communicates through the NASA Deep Space Network (DSN) to receive routine commands and to transmit data to Earth. Real-time distance and velocity data are provided by NASA and Jet Propulsion Laboratory, JPL. At a distance of from Earth , it is the most distant human-made object from Earth. The probe made Flyby (spaceflight), flybys of Jupiter, Saturn, and Saturn's largest Natural satellite, moon, Titan (moon), Titan. NASA had a choice of either conducting a Pluto or Titan flyby. Exploration of Titan took priority because it was known to have a substantial atmosphere. ''Voyager 1'' studied the weather, magnetic fields, and rings of the two gas giants and was the first probe to provide detailed images of their ...
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Fermi Acceleration
Fermi acceleration, sometimes referred to as ''diffusive shock acceleration'' (a subclass of Fermi accelerationOn the Origin of the Cosmic Radiation, E. Fermi, Physical Review 75, pp. 1169-1174, 1949), is the acceleration that charged particles undergo when being repeatedly reflected, usually by a magnetic mirror (see also Centrifugal mechanism of acceleration). It receives its name from physicist Enrico Fermi who first proposed the mechanism. This is thought to be the primary mechanism by which particles gain non-thermal energies in astrophysical shock waves. It plays a very important role in many astrophysical models, mainly of shocks including solar flares and supernova remnant A supernova remnant (SNR) is the structure resulting from the explosion of a star in a supernova. The supernova remnant is bounded by an expanding shock wave, and consists of ejected material expanding from the explosion, and the interstellar mat ...s. There are two types of Fermi acceleration: first ...
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Ultraviolet
Ultraviolet radiation, also known as simply UV, is electromagnetic radiation of wavelengths of 10–400 nanometers, shorter than that of visible light, but longer than X-rays. UV radiation is present in sunlight and constitutes about 10% of the total electromagnetic radiation output from the Sun. It is also produced by electric arcs, Cherenkov radiation, and specialized lights, such as mercury-vapor lamps, tanning lamps, and black lights. The photons of ultraviolet have greater energy than those of visible light, from about 3.1 to 12  electron volts, around the minimum energy required to ionize atoms. Although long-wavelength ultraviolet is not considered an ionizing radiation because its photons lack sufficient energy, it can induce chemical reactions and cause many substances to glow or fluoresce. Many practical applications, including chemical and biological effects, are derived from the way that UV radiation can interact with organic molecules. The ...
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SPACE
Space is a three-dimensional continuum containing positions and directions. In classical physics, physical space is often conceived in three linear dimensions. Modern physicists usually consider it, with time, to be part of a boundless four-dimensional continuum known as '' spacetime''. The concept of space is considered to be of fundamental importance to an understanding of the physical universe. However, disagreement continues between philosophers over whether it is itself an entity, a relationship between entities, or part of a conceptual framework. In the 19th and 20th centuries mathematicians began to examine geometries that are non-Euclidean, in which space is conceived as '' curved'', rather than '' flat'', as in the Euclidean space. According to Albert Einstein's theory of general relativity, space around gravitational fields deviates from Euclidean space. Experimental tests of general relativity have confirmed that non-Euclidean geometries provide a bet ...
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Interstellar Medium
The interstellar medium (ISM) is the matter and radiation that exists in the outer space, space between the star systems in a galaxy. This matter includes gas in ionic, atomic, and molecular form, as well as cosmic dust, dust and cosmic rays. It fills interstellar space and blends smoothly into the surrounding intergalactic medium. The energy that occupies the same volume, in the form of electromagnetic radiation, is the interstellar radiation field. Although the density of atoms in the ISM is usually far below that in the best laboratory vacuums, the mean free path between collisions is short compared to typical interstellar lengths, so on these scales the ISM behaves as a gas (more precisely, as a Plasma (physics), plasma: it is everywhere at least slightly ionized), responding to pressure forces, and not as a collection of non-interacting particles. The interstellar medium is composed of multiple phases distinguished by whether matter is ionic, atomic, or molecular, and the temp ...
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