Giant Veil of "Cold Plasma" Discovered High Above Earth

Clouds of charged particles stretch a quarter the way to the moon, experts say.

National Geographic News, Dave Mosher, January 26, 2012

An artist's rendering of ESA's Cluster II spacecraft in orbit.

Illustration courtesy J. Huart, ESA

Clouds of "cold plasma" reach from the top of Earth's atmosphere to at least a quarter the distance to the moon, according to new data from a cluster of European satellites.

Earth generates cold plasma—slow-moving charged particles—at the edge of space, where sunlight strips electrons from gas atoms, leaving only their positively charged cores, or nuclei.

(Find out how cold plasma might also help explain why Mars is missing its atmosphere.)

Researchers had suspected these hard-to-detect particles might influence incoming space weather, such as this week's solar flare and resulting geomagnetic storm. That's because solar storms barrage Earth with similar but high-speed charged particles.

Still, no one could be certain what the effects of cold plasma might be without a handle on its true abundance around our planet.

"It's like the weather forecast on TV. It's very complicated to make a reasonable forecast without the basic variables," said space scientist Mats André, of the Swedish Institute of Space Physics.

"Discovering this cold plasma is like saying, Oh gosh, there are oceans here that affect our weather," he said.

(Related: "Warm Plasma Cloak' Discovered Enveloping Earth.")

The Trick to Finding Cold Plasma

Researchers already knew that some cold plasma existed in the ionosphere, about 60 miles (100 kilometers) above Earth's surface. But few researchers had looked for the clouds between 12,400 and 60,000 miles (20,000 and 100,000 kilometers) high.

(Also see "Pictures: Giant Walls of Plasma Seen on Sun.")

André and his colleague Chris Cully suspected the plasma could be out there, but they knew the positive charge of spacecraft wasn't helping any search efforts.

Similar to the way cold plasma is created, sunlight strips electrons from spacecraft materials, making their hulls positively charged. Like two matching magnetic poles, a spacecraft would simply repulse any cold plasma around it.

To find the stuff, André and Cully instead analyzed anomalies in data from the European Space Agency's Cluster II spacecraft.

This group of four satellites swings around Earth in a highly elliptical orbit. At the orbit's peak, the probes reach nearly halfway to the moon.

The enormous distance gives researchers a chance to sweep through and monitor Earth's magnetic field and electrical activity, including the influence of "hot" charged particles emitted by the sun.

Anomalies in the Cluster II data turned out to be shockwaves from cold plasma particles moving around the satellites.

Cold Plasma a Space Weather "Elephant"

In the end, the pair found that cold plasma makes up between 50 and 70 percent of all charged particles within the farther reaches of Earth's magnetic field.

(Related: "Mini Magnetic Shield Found on the Moon.")

André says it's now time to start updating space-weather models to take the extra cold plasma into account—at this point, for instance, nothing is known about how the plasma might affect solar storms.

This influence is "not a minor thing in space weather," André said. "It's an elephant in the room."

The cold-plasma study has been accepted for publication in Geophysical Research Letters.

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Biggest solar storm in years bombards Earth

Beacons of Light May 2010: The perfect storm in 2012

This message spoke of the sun and what to expect in the days just ahead. They said there was another round of solar flares that were about to begin. I am aware that we are having them right now but they still are not the intensity and the regularity that we will have them in the next three years. The year 2012 was of particular note. They said to watch direct sun exposure during that year. Its not about how much you get but about how much you are accustomed to getting. This is the second or third channel recently where they equate gravity to magnetism but I will say that our sciences do not agree with that as of yet.

What they did say is that the sun is aligning to once again shower us with a pelt of solar flares. The events that were originally scripted to put a final end to earth are about to happen on a scaled down version with the energy redirected. In fact this coming event has all the ear-markings of the perfect storm in 2012. Only this time Scotty is yelling to Captain Kirk that the shields wont hold as the protective shields of earth known as the magnetosphere now have large holes in them and they are still full of plasma from the last attack. This means we will feel much more of the effects of these flares in our personal world and bodies. They said the emotional bodies we carry are magnetic based and they will vary the most as these fields shift. How much fun is that boys and girls? Can anyone remember why we signed up for this human thing?

Big hugs

Steve Rother

Magnetics: Always a Player in The Shift

“…. Many things are happening with the planet at the moment. The magnetics are changing as well. The magnetics of the solar system and the sun in particular, have an influence on your weather. How many sun spots have you seen lately? What do you think about the correlation of a sun that has very few, with your earth climate?  When can you remember that in your lifetime? What does it mean? I will tell you, dear Human Beings, that it's all related to what's happening on the earth. You may not understand the correlation, but I will tell you there is a profound one. What if [astronomy hint coming next], what if sun spots were created by gravitational and other interdimensional forces caused by the orbiting planets? Has there even been a correlation made between sun spots and the positions of the planets? Too weird? The invitation is there to see the correlations.

The sun is the fulcrum of the interdimensional gravitational pull attributes of the planets around it. There is information that is interdimensional – call it a gravitational patterning, if you wish – which the sun generates every moment of the day. As the planets push and pull on the fulcrum of the solar system [effect the sun through gravity], they affect the sun's attitude. These patterns are unique every day, and they intersect the magnetic field of the earth as they are blasted from the Sun in what you would call the solar wind.

The solar wind is a magnetic heliosphere, and has very multidimensional properties. This magnetic wind strikes the earth, intersecting with the magnetic field, and you can see it! You call it the Aurora Borealis. It's one giant magnetic field [the sun] intersecting another [the earth]. Science calls this intersecting phenomena inductance. In that intersecting energy, there is a transference of the informative patterning of the sun [at that moment] to the magnetic grid of the earth. Now, it's the magnetic grid of the planet that you sit in. All of life does.

Now we give you information we've given you before: The Merkabah. That is to say, your DNA imprint - the field around you - receives the magnetic grid's sun information, and the instructions within that field are passed right to the DNA, which is also magnetic. I have just given you the magnetic transmission chain that you think is esoteric. It's not. It's hard science. But to think that the interdimensional, magnetic and gravitational attributes of the solar system are going to your DNA is very esoteric. Some call it astrology. The truth is that it's for humanity, and also for Gaia! For remember that it is the earth that is part of the magnetic chain of information to your cellular structure [the Magnetic Grid]. It tells it when to do what it does. It's all related. So how related are you to Gaia? How much do you address this consciousness?.....” Read more .....(THE RELATIONSHIP TO GAIA - April 2010 (Kryon Channeling))