![]() | This ![]() It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
yow people whay? is there a solar wind..... who has discovered it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.17.132.42 ( talk) 12:12, 17 December 2004 (UTC)
This is a difficult question. Observations of cometary tails pointing away from the Sun date back to the first millenium BC. Some sources cite Chinese astronomers to have postulated the existence of a solar life to explain this. Kepler talked about sunlight pressure in the 17th century to explain this. Ludwig Biermann came up in 1951 with the idea of a supersonic wind blowing from the Sun with a speed of the order of 1,000 km s-1, but did not come up with any mechanism for this acceleration. After the realization that Chapman theory of the solar corona in hydrostatic did not work (because it predicts an interstellar pressure orders of magnitude too large), Parker came up with his classical solution in 1958. USferdinand 07:42, 17 January 2007 (UTC)
is there any relation between the temperature of the earth and solar winds? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.17.132.42 ( talk) 12:12, 17 December 2004 (UTC)
No, for two reasons. Firstly, most of the sun's outputted energy is in the form of photons, not particles. Secondly, the solar wind is almost completely deflected by the Earth's magnetic field. If it wasn't, we'd be bombarded by ultra-high-energy particles, develop cancer, and die. This is why space ships have to be well shielded; even so, there is some risk of excess radiation exposure to astronauts. Ckerr 08:57, 3 November 2005 (UTC)
There are relationships between the temperature of the atmosphere and the aurora, but only in specific areas, not in the atmosphere as a whole. The subsolar point of the Earth - the region beneath the sun, receiving the greatest amount of heating - can never cover both poles sufficiently to provide as much energy there as the aurora do. In addition, on the nightside, there's no solar heating, asides from conduction. The aurora occur close enough to the highly conducting thermosphere to allow an effect to be seen there. To really see an aurora creating havoc with a planetary atmosphere, though, you need to go out to Jupiter, where an aurora providing 100x as much energy as that of the earth mixes with a far reduced solar photon flux (about a quarter of that at Earth) and so has a more pronounced effect. At Saturn, an aurora of comparable power input to that of the Earth exists in an even lower solar photon flux. This gives an indication of the relative power inputs of the sun and the aurora. Modeled auroral oval. However, the origin of the various aurora are not necessarily all connected to the solar wind. The solar wind acts as a dynamo, creating currents that drive other sources of high energy particles into the atmosphere. At Jupiter, this is a very weak effect due to a massive magnetospher deflecting particles, whereas at Earth it is the dominant effect. Other planets differ. MilleauRekiir 17:37, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
The idea of the solar wind carrrying the sun's magnetic field with it is wrong. Electric currents create magnetic fields. The solar wind is creating its own magnetic fields and interacting with the existing solar magnetic field.They are locked in a feedback loop. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.145.72.189 ( talk) 21:32, 6 May 2005 (UTC)
The current is set at the solar surface, when the wind is emitted. The magnetic and electric environment is confined by the fact that the emitted particles are in a plasma, therefore the wind carries out the signature of the solar magnetic field as it is just another part of the outer plasma of the Sun, just an unconfined, radially flowing one. MilleauRekiir 17:14, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
Maxwell's equations do not state that electric fields/currents create magnetic fields/flows (or vice versa), merely that the two ways of describing a plasma are equivalent e.g., The alternative paradigm for magnetospheric physics, Parker, JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH, VOL. 101, NO. A5, PAGES 10,587-10,625, MAY 1, 1996. Thus it is completely valid to talk in terms of the solar wind "dragging" the coronal magnetic field out to form the heliospheric magnetic field, HMF (which is the more accurate term given to the interplanetary magnetic field, IMF). While coronal dynamics are dominated by the magnetic field, leading to the formation of coronal loops which channel the coronal plasma, at increasing altitude in the solar atmosphere the acceleration of the solar wind means that the flow momentum becomes comparable to the restraining magnetic tension force and the coronal loops are dragged out by the solar wind to to form the HMF e.g., The heliospheric magnetic field, Owens and Forsyth, Living Reviews in Solar Physics, 10, 5, doi: 10.12942/lrsp-2013-5, 2013. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Heliophysics ( talk • contribs) 18:24, 31 January 2017 (UTC)
Cosmic Magnetic Fields are not bounded such that they are "dragged out" where they were not present before, just dragged to a stronger flux intensity. Its better then to say that the wind and magnetic flux are "superposed", as they are, rather than one "embedded" in the other. Both are embedded in spacetime, together. 2602:304:CFA5:42A0:80C6:BFF1:F5B:A88F ( talk) 03:07, 18 July 2021 (UTC)
Plasma is not a gas. Plasma follows its own rules just as a gas behaves differently than a solid. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.145.72.189 ( talk) 21:32, 6 May 2005 (UTC)
Comment: I was under the impression that it is debated whether it should be classified as it's own form of matter. 143.195.150.63 —Preceding undated comment added 01:29, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
The total amount of mass lost by the Sun due to solar wind is about 600,000 tonnes per second. The figure of 800 kg/s cited above is clearly wrong. The density of the solar wind at 1 A.U. (7 protons per cubic cm, (or 7*10^6 protons/cm^3), the surface of an sphere with such a diameter (2.5 10^22 m^2) and the average solar wind speed of 400 km/s (4*10^5 m/s)lead to an estimate of about 7*10^35 protons per second leaving the Sun, or 1 million tonnes per second. I have a figure of 600,000 tonnes per second coming from a paper which I cannot find right now. J. R. Crespo Lopez-Urrutia 149.217.1.6 10:37, 6 September 2005 (UTC)
The sun loses mass primarily in two ways. Some of it is the solar wind; the remainder is the mass-energy of emitted light. The present article as it now stands says, "...Thus, the total mass loss each year is about (2–3) × 10^-14 solar masses,[15] or 6.7 billion tons per hour." (I am guessing that the author intended "tonne" rather than "ton".) 6.7 billion tonne per hour is 1.85 x 10^9 kg/s. One might infer that this figure refers only to the mass loss due to the solar wind, but that is not made clear.
The wiki article on "sun", in the section on "core", says, "About 9.2 × 10^37 protons (hydrogen nuclei) are converted into helium nuclei every second (out of ~8.9 × 10^56 total amount of free protons in the Sun), or about 4.4 × 10^9 kg per second,[46] releasing energy at the matter–energy conversion rate of 4.26 million metric tons per second, 383 yottawatts (3.83×10^26 W),[46] or 9.15 × 10^10 megatons of TNT per second." 4.26 million metric tons per second = 4.26 x 10^9 kg/s. Clearly, this does not include mass loss due to the solar wind's rest mass, though it presumably does include the mass equivalent of the solar wind's kinetic energy.
I would like to see some clarification of the relative contributions of sunlight and the solar wind to the total mass loss of the sun.
I would also like to see a stricter adherence to SI units. "Metric ton" should be replaced by "Tonne"; better yet use only kg as the unit of mass. Non-SI units, such as hour, day, year, ton, tonne, megatons of TNT, etc. should be included only in parenthetical comments after the correct SI units have been given. -- Onerock ( talk) 17:52, 30 July 2009 (UTC)
I was going to ask what the average density of the solar wind is at the radius of Earth's orbit (1 AU), and then saw that this is answered above (7*10^6 protons/m^3). I think it's important enough to appear in the article if a reference can be cited (I would do this myself if I could verify it). Pharmagiles ( talk) 00:18, 26 January 2011 (UTC)
The given number of mass loss in the article is certainly wrong in relation to the solar wind. That number is the mass converted into pure energy. M = E/c^2 gives that number 4.289e9 kg/s = 4.289e6 tonnes/s = 1.35257904e+17 kg/yr. However, the actual fusion process involves some 700 million tons/s of that 0.7 percent is actually loss due to energy conversion. There's no means to calculate what part of the process ends up being the wind. Therefore, the measured particles are the only means to determine the solar wind mass. Protons are certainly the main part that matter for most every other use but they are not everything contained in the wind. We need more precise numbers and composition tables to arrive at a more correct mass for the wind. Mightyname ( talk) 17:31, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
Article's intro says that solar wind can explain "formation of distant stars" but I see nothing in article body on the subject. If it's a true statement, should add text about it or at least a link; otherwise delete. FRS 17:28, 12 October 2005 (UTC)
I just thought about this: Could solar wind be a significant source of the formation of heavy isotopes of hydrogen by the fusion of high velocity protons and neutrons? The small proportion of neutrons in solar wind should follow a newtonian trajectory, while the protons follow one that is also influenced by magnetic fields. There is thus the possibility of collisions between these two particles. This might be more likely when the protons are within the influence of the magnetic fields of planets, as this would cause the protons and neutrons to follow quite different paths and thus accelerate relative to each other. If this mode of fusion is exothermic it might account for some of the 'unknown' energy that accelerates the solar wind that the article refers to. Any opinions?-- ChrisJMoor 03:11, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
They would intially both follow radial paths from the Solar surface. When interacting in a shock boundary, the neutrons would interact at a shock developing in response to the atmosphere, whereas protons are trapped outside the magnetosphere, some distance behind. Although it would be more likely to happen as the neutrons pass through the proton shock, the high energies and low densities involved would both work against the initial combination. The high temperature of the plasma would also threaten to distabilise the produced atom. For heavier isotopes, the entire process would have to happen more than once. If we're considering this to be happening in a proton shock, it would be more likely for more protons rather than more neutrons to join and create helium 3 rather than say deuterium. Its difficult enough for this to happen at the densities represented by the upper atmosphere, never mind the outer magnetosphere, but the massive numbers mean there'll probably be a little... MilleauRekiir 17:21, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
This discussion highlights the fact that there's currently no mention of the mean-free path of solar wind particles and that is it essentially collision-free. That probably needs addressing. Heliophysics ( talk) 13:39, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
Mars's atmospheric pressure makes one's farts more condensed, therefore causing a stronger and more pungent aroma, especially when solar winds blow it around.
Should this section really appear in this article? It sounds like a joke. Init 19:49, 15 April 2007 (UTC)
It shouldn't be, I will remove it if its still in there! GB 04:15, 16 April 2007 (UTC)
How many newtons per square meter could solar wind exert on an object at 1 AU from the sun, outside earth's magnetic field? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jwr42 ( talk • contribs) 21:38, 16 June 2007 (UTC)
The entry for Mercury states that it has a magnetosphere strong enough to deflect the solar wind, and that while its low gravitational pull prevents it building up a significant atmosphere, it does have detectable amounts of various gases from a variety of sources. This article implies strongly that the solar wind scours all gases from the planet. There appears to be a conflict. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.243.235.134 ( talk) 19:17, 26 September 2007 (UTC)
I was disappointed to find no remarks regarding the distribution of the solar wind. It seems likely that it is either highly irregular and unpredictable or focused about the ecliptlic plane. Francis of Hochbergm 8/2/08 -- Francis of Hochberg ( talk) 16:47, 2 August 2008 (UTC)
I think that interplanetary medium is basically a fork article that doesn't mention anything not in this article. I think this article could safely swallow it. Serendi pod ous 16:53, 3 August 2008 (UTC)
with Heliosphere? Serendi pod ous 13:16, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
Ions. So can someone provide a list of ions and their relative abundance/flux in the solar wind? What it is. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.49.113.189 ( talk) 03:39, 14 January 2009 (UTC)
Energy. The 2nd sentence states that the electron energies are on the order of "10-100 eV". That sounds too low, since it goes on to say that that these particles needed "high kinetic energy to escape the sun's gravitation. So I think the energies should at least be into the kilo electron Volt range. maybe 10-200 keV? Jdagius ( talk) 00:09, 29 August 2010 (UTC)
No. Average solar wind speed is around 450km/s, between 400 and 800km/s depending on fast or slow solar wind. Ion temperature is about 20-200 kilokelvins. Cinetic energy is more or less 2keV (for 430km/s), thermal energy is some tens of eV. So the total energy is between 1.5 and 8 keV. I have no idea where 10-200 eV or keV comes from. I'm changing it. There are some evidence of high energy particles, coming from CMEs or something. But it is a minority, and should not be refereed to as "standard solar wind".
-- Forcimonie ( talk) 11:46, 4 August 2011 (UTC)
I agree thermal energy--at 1 AU-- is on the order of a few 10's of eV. I found 2 simulations that take the Te to be 40 and 10 eV respectively. These correspond to thermal temperatures of 100,000 to 500,000 K. 72.160.11.165 ( talk) 19:37, 8 March 2013 (UTC) Warren Platts
The article on solar sail says "The force due to light pressure is about 5,000 times as strong as that due to solar wind". In this case, how can solar wind be considered responsible for the tail of comets rather than light pressure ? I understand it may be the case for the gas part of the tail if the cross section of an atom (or generally what this gas is made of) is much smaller with respect to light than with respect to elements of the solar wind (electrons and protons); but for dust particles I guess the radiative pressure dominates. Also, a very approximate calculation from this figure together with a value of solar wind speed of 600 km/s, suggests that the total mass loss of the Sun each year due to sun-light through E=mc2 is about 10 times largerr than the one due to solar wind. This would be worth mentioning together with more exact figures. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Spoirier ( talk • contribs) 14:55, 22 June 2009 (UTC)
I read a scientific paper, published way back in 1991, about the interaction between the solar wind and the geomagnetic field. The author seems to think that the length of the solar cycle is related to variations in earth's temperature. I wonder if anyone else has tried to correlate solar activity and things like cloud formation. -- Uncle Ed ( talk) 18:48, 22 February 2010 (UTC)
Although I don't have access to the Birkeland paper referenced in [2], I believe (based on comments in "Rethinking the History of Solar Wind Studies: Eddington's Analysis of Comet Morehouse") that the sentence should read:
-- Kmote ( talk) 20:29, 17 May 2011 (UTC)
"The Sun's corona, or extended outer layer, is a region of plasma that is heated to over a million degrees Celsius. As a result of thermal collisions, the particles within the inner corona have a range and distribution of speeds described by a Maxwellian distribution." What is supposed to be a thermal collision? I guess is that collisions are due to thermal heating, but imho stated like that is quite unclear.-- 79.20.34.174 ( talk) 09:44, 19 December 2011 (UTC)
We need to say more about the solar cycle and sunspots. The solar wind varies--in density, velocity, temperature, and magnetic field properties--with the solar cycle. [5] -- Uncle Ed ( talk) 06:02, 4 February 2012 (UTC)
Agreed. A section on the time scales of variation of the solar wind is required. These would range from seconds/minutes due to turbulent eddies, through days and structures such as corotating interaction regions (CIRs) resulting from solar rotation, to solar cycle variations and centennial/millennial variations. I'm happy to start putting this together if no-one objects? Heliophysics ( talk) 13:33, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
Early in the article, it is mentioned that the solar wind is comprised of Protons and Electrons.
In the "Planetary surfaces" section it ends with "enriched in atomic nuclei deposited from the solar wind".
My question is - where did the neutrons come from? I am unclear as to whether there is the assumption that some electrons merge with protons to create neutrons. Or whether the solar wind strips electrons off of ordinary matter, leaving atomic nuclei behind.
Or are neutrons part of the solar wind to begin with? If not, why not - is there something about charge that causes the initial acceleration?
Or possibly there is something understood but not directly presented here.
pcG PcGnome ( talk) 07:27, 23 August 2012 (UTC)
"Ions" is an incomplete answer. Ions are charged particles. What kind of charged particles? Electrons? Protons? Alpha particles? He+? muons? what? 74.82.132.35 ( talk) 20:06, 30 January 2013 (UTC)
The usage of Stellar Wind ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) is under discussion, see talk:Stellar Wind (code name) -- 70.50.148.122 ( talk) 06:52, 26 January 2014 (UTC)
The usage of the word in the second paragraph seems silly at best, saying a few hundred miles an hour and then immediately after claiming a million. It also has little or even ambiguous relevance in space as "supersonic" on Venus is certainly different than on Earth.
129.130.41.55 ( talk) 22:10, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Solar wind/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.
Overall I agree with the B-rating but not with the Mid-importance (I changed it to High). Extrasolar planet, for example, is a High-importance article and I think solar wind should have a similar importance. Concerning the rating, first stellar wind should not link here. Also, the general section of properties (the subsection are fine, I believe) need work. For example, the composition is confusing. I have no clue where the 200 to 889 km/s speed comes from. USferdinand 00:53, 2 February 2007 (UTC) |
Last edited at 00:53, 2 February 2007 (UTC). Substituted at 06:28, 30 April 2016 (UTC)
I'm not seeing this covered in the article, at all. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 23:46, 5 May 2016 (UTC)
The Poulos article has major advancements in solar wind, solar activity and climate variability. Instead of deleting the references one could critisise if he has any critics. This theory is out since 2005 in earlier texts and has had no refutations yet. It only has strict mathematical proof. Kadefe ( talk) 10:44, 20 May 2016 (UTC)
There is zero chance that this article is ever going to be used as a reference in Wikipedia. I suggest you find some better way to contribute to the project. -- JBL ( talk) 15:45, 21 May 2016 (UTC)
How's that, I admire your arguments. Kadefe ( talk) 17:25, 21 May 2016 (UTC)
Surprised to find nothing about the composition of the solar wind (or can't find it if it is mentioned). It consists of protons largely - and 8% of alpha particles - so hydrogen and helium nuclei. But it also has trace amounts of other elements. See this summary from Stanford university [6]
"The composition of the solar wind is a mixture of materials found in the solar plasma, composed of ionized hydrogen (electrons and protons) with an 8% component of helium (alpha particles) and trace amounts of heavy ions and atomic nuclei: C, N, O, Ne, Mg, Si, S, and Fe ripped apart by heating of the Sun's outer atmosphere, that is, the corona (Feldman et al., 1998).
SOHO also identified traces of some elements for the first time such as P, Ti, Cr and Ni and an assortment of solar wind isotopes identified for the first time: Fe 54 and 56; Ni 58,60,62 (Galvin, 1996)!
Perhaps this could be mentioned in the article if it's not included, or highlighted? The helium 3 in the solar wind also seems worth mentioning, because of the ideas of helium 3 implanted in the lunar regolith, if anyone knows what they are. Robert Walker ( talk) 06:07, 26 December 2016 (UTC)
At a distance of more than a few solar radii from the Sun, the solar wind is supersonic and reaches speeds of 250 to 750 kilometers per second. [1]
At a distance of more than a few solar radii from the Sun, the solar wind reaches speeds of 250 to 750 kilometers per second and is supersonic, [1] meaning it moves faster than the speed of the fast magnetosonic wave. citation needed
References
Heliospheric current sheet says "The solar wind is guided by the Sun's magnetic field and hence largely emanates from the polar regions of the Sun;" but it does not seem to be mentioned in this article. What is known about the properties of the solar wind away from the ecliptic or the suns equator ? - Rod57 ( talk) 17:59, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified 2 external links on Solar wind. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
This message was posted before February 2018.
After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than
regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors
have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the
RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{
source check}}
(last update: 5 June 2024).
Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot ( Report bug) 06:13, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
Sun radius : Earth orbit radius yields around 0.0043 or sth. Surface goes square so we have 50.000 times as much mass density of solar wind on Sun surface. exact values to our knowledge? Wikistallion ( talk) 19:16, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
"Solar wind" is just the term we use to refer to stellar wind caused by our star. We don't make independent articles for all terms of this type, so why this one? 199.45.195.249 ( talk) 01:43, 12 May 2024 (UTC)
![]() | This ![]() It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
yow people whay? is there a solar wind..... who has discovered it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.17.132.42 ( talk) 12:12, 17 December 2004 (UTC)
This is a difficult question. Observations of cometary tails pointing away from the Sun date back to the first millenium BC. Some sources cite Chinese astronomers to have postulated the existence of a solar life to explain this. Kepler talked about sunlight pressure in the 17th century to explain this. Ludwig Biermann came up in 1951 with the idea of a supersonic wind blowing from the Sun with a speed of the order of 1,000 km s-1, but did not come up with any mechanism for this acceleration. After the realization that Chapman theory of the solar corona in hydrostatic did not work (because it predicts an interstellar pressure orders of magnitude too large), Parker came up with his classical solution in 1958. USferdinand 07:42, 17 January 2007 (UTC)
is there any relation between the temperature of the earth and solar winds? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.17.132.42 ( talk) 12:12, 17 December 2004 (UTC)
No, for two reasons. Firstly, most of the sun's outputted energy is in the form of photons, not particles. Secondly, the solar wind is almost completely deflected by the Earth's magnetic field. If it wasn't, we'd be bombarded by ultra-high-energy particles, develop cancer, and die. This is why space ships have to be well shielded; even so, there is some risk of excess radiation exposure to astronauts. Ckerr 08:57, 3 November 2005 (UTC)
There are relationships between the temperature of the atmosphere and the aurora, but only in specific areas, not in the atmosphere as a whole. The subsolar point of the Earth - the region beneath the sun, receiving the greatest amount of heating - can never cover both poles sufficiently to provide as much energy there as the aurora do. In addition, on the nightside, there's no solar heating, asides from conduction. The aurora occur close enough to the highly conducting thermosphere to allow an effect to be seen there. To really see an aurora creating havoc with a planetary atmosphere, though, you need to go out to Jupiter, where an aurora providing 100x as much energy as that of the earth mixes with a far reduced solar photon flux (about a quarter of that at Earth) and so has a more pronounced effect. At Saturn, an aurora of comparable power input to that of the Earth exists in an even lower solar photon flux. This gives an indication of the relative power inputs of the sun and the aurora. Modeled auroral oval. However, the origin of the various aurora are not necessarily all connected to the solar wind. The solar wind acts as a dynamo, creating currents that drive other sources of high energy particles into the atmosphere. At Jupiter, this is a very weak effect due to a massive magnetospher deflecting particles, whereas at Earth it is the dominant effect. Other planets differ. MilleauRekiir 17:37, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
The idea of the solar wind carrrying the sun's magnetic field with it is wrong. Electric currents create magnetic fields. The solar wind is creating its own magnetic fields and interacting with the existing solar magnetic field.They are locked in a feedback loop. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.145.72.189 ( talk) 21:32, 6 May 2005 (UTC)
The current is set at the solar surface, when the wind is emitted. The magnetic and electric environment is confined by the fact that the emitted particles are in a plasma, therefore the wind carries out the signature of the solar magnetic field as it is just another part of the outer plasma of the Sun, just an unconfined, radially flowing one. MilleauRekiir 17:14, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
Maxwell's equations do not state that electric fields/currents create magnetic fields/flows (or vice versa), merely that the two ways of describing a plasma are equivalent e.g., The alternative paradigm for magnetospheric physics, Parker, JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH, VOL. 101, NO. A5, PAGES 10,587-10,625, MAY 1, 1996. Thus it is completely valid to talk in terms of the solar wind "dragging" the coronal magnetic field out to form the heliospheric magnetic field, HMF (which is the more accurate term given to the interplanetary magnetic field, IMF). While coronal dynamics are dominated by the magnetic field, leading to the formation of coronal loops which channel the coronal plasma, at increasing altitude in the solar atmosphere the acceleration of the solar wind means that the flow momentum becomes comparable to the restraining magnetic tension force and the coronal loops are dragged out by the solar wind to to form the HMF e.g., The heliospheric magnetic field, Owens and Forsyth, Living Reviews in Solar Physics, 10, 5, doi: 10.12942/lrsp-2013-5, 2013. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Heliophysics ( talk • contribs) 18:24, 31 January 2017 (UTC)
Cosmic Magnetic Fields are not bounded such that they are "dragged out" where they were not present before, just dragged to a stronger flux intensity. Its better then to say that the wind and magnetic flux are "superposed", as they are, rather than one "embedded" in the other. Both are embedded in spacetime, together. 2602:304:CFA5:42A0:80C6:BFF1:F5B:A88F ( talk) 03:07, 18 July 2021 (UTC)
Plasma is not a gas. Plasma follows its own rules just as a gas behaves differently than a solid. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.145.72.189 ( talk) 21:32, 6 May 2005 (UTC)
Comment: I was under the impression that it is debated whether it should be classified as it's own form of matter. 143.195.150.63 —Preceding undated comment added 01:29, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
The total amount of mass lost by the Sun due to solar wind is about 600,000 tonnes per second. The figure of 800 kg/s cited above is clearly wrong. The density of the solar wind at 1 A.U. (7 protons per cubic cm, (or 7*10^6 protons/cm^3), the surface of an sphere with such a diameter (2.5 10^22 m^2) and the average solar wind speed of 400 km/s (4*10^5 m/s)lead to an estimate of about 7*10^35 protons per second leaving the Sun, or 1 million tonnes per second. I have a figure of 600,000 tonnes per second coming from a paper which I cannot find right now. J. R. Crespo Lopez-Urrutia 149.217.1.6 10:37, 6 September 2005 (UTC)
The sun loses mass primarily in two ways. Some of it is the solar wind; the remainder is the mass-energy of emitted light. The present article as it now stands says, "...Thus, the total mass loss each year is about (2–3) × 10^-14 solar masses,[15] or 6.7 billion tons per hour." (I am guessing that the author intended "tonne" rather than "ton".) 6.7 billion tonne per hour is 1.85 x 10^9 kg/s. One might infer that this figure refers only to the mass loss due to the solar wind, but that is not made clear.
The wiki article on "sun", in the section on "core", says, "About 9.2 × 10^37 protons (hydrogen nuclei) are converted into helium nuclei every second (out of ~8.9 × 10^56 total amount of free protons in the Sun), or about 4.4 × 10^9 kg per second,[46] releasing energy at the matter–energy conversion rate of 4.26 million metric tons per second, 383 yottawatts (3.83×10^26 W),[46] or 9.15 × 10^10 megatons of TNT per second." 4.26 million metric tons per second = 4.26 x 10^9 kg/s. Clearly, this does not include mass loss due to the solar wind's rest mass, though it presumably does include the mass equivalent of the solar wind's kinetic energy.
I would like to see some clarification of the relative contributions of sunlight and the solar wind to the total mass loss of the sun.
I would also like to see a stricter adherence to SI units. "Metric ton" should be replaced by "Tonne"; better yet use only kg as the unit of mass. Non-SI units, such as hour, day, year, ton, tonne, megatons of TNT, etc. should be included only in parenthetical comments after the correct SI units have been given. -- Onerock ( talk) 17:52, 30 July 2009 (UTC)
I was going to ask what the average density of the solar wind is at the radius of Earth's orbit (1 AU), and then saw that this is answered above (7*10^6 protons/m^3). I think it's important enough to appear in the article if a reference can be cited (I would do this myself if I could verify it). Pharmagiles ( talk) 00:18, 26 January 2011 (UTC)
The given number of mass loss in the article is certainly wrong in relation to the solar wind. That number is the mass converted into pure energy. M = E/c^2 gives that number 4.289e9 kg/s = 4.289e6 tonnes/s = 1.35257904e+17 kg/yr. However, the actual fusion process involves some 700 million tons/s of that 0.7 percent is actually loss due to energy conversion. There's no means to calculate what part of the process ends up being the wind. Therefore, the measured particles are the only means to determine the solar wind mass. Protons are certainly the main part that matter for most every other use but they are not everything contained in the wind. We need more precise numbers and composition tables to arrive at a more correct mass for the wind. Mightyname ( talk) 17:31, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
Article's intro says that solar wind can explain "formation of distant stars" but I see nothing in article body on the subject. If it's a true statement, should add text about it or at least a link; otherwise delete. FRS 17:28, 12 October 2005 (UTC)
I just thought about this: Could solar wind be a significant source of the formation of heavy isotopes of hydrogen by the fusion of high velocity protons and neutrons? The small proportion of neutrons in solar wind should follow a newtonian trajectory, while the protons follow one that is also influenced by magnetic fields. There is thus the possibility of collisions between these two particles. This might be more likely when the protons are within the influence of the magnetic fields of planets, as this would cause the protons and neutrons to follow quite different paths and thus accelerate relative to each other. If this mode of fusion is exothermic it might account for some of the 'unknown' energy that accelerates the solar wind that the article refers to. Any opinions?-- ChrisJMoor 03:11, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
They would intially both follow radial paths from the Solar surface. When interacting in a shock boundary, the neutrons would interact at a shock developing in response to the atmosphere, whereas protons are trapped outside the magnetosphere, some distance behind. Although it would be more likely to happen as the neutrons pass through the proton shock, the high energies and low densities involved would both work against the initial combination. The high temperature of the plasma would also threaten to distabilise the produced atom. For heavier isotopes, the entire process would have to happen more than once. If we're considering this to be happening in a proton shock, it would be more likely for more protons rather than more neutrons to join and create helium 3 rather than say deuterium. Its difficult enough for this to happen at the densities represented by the upper atmosphere, never mind the outer magnetosphere, but the massive numbers mean there'll probably be a little... MilleauRekiir 17:21, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
This discussion highlights the fact that there's currently no mention of the mean-free path of solar wind particles and that is it essentially collision-free. That probably needs addressing. Heliophysics ( talk) 13:39, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
Mars's atmospheric pressure makes one's farts more condensed, therefore causing a stronger and more pungent aroma, especially when solar winds blow it around.
Should this section really appear in this article? It sounds like a joke. Init 19:49, 15 April 2007 (UTC)
It shouldn't be, I will remove it if its still in there! GB 04:15, 16 April 2007 (UTC)
How many newtons per square meter could solar wind exert on an object at 1 AU from the sun, outside earth's magnetic field? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jwr42 ( talk • contribs) 21:38, 16 June 2007 (UTC)
The entry for Mercury states that it has a magnetosphere strong enough to deflect the solar wind, and that while its low gravitational pull prevents it building up a significant atmosphere, it does have detectable amounts of various gases from a variety of sources. This article implies strongly that the solar wind scours all gases from the planet. There appears to be a conflict. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.243.235.134 ( talk) 19:17, 26 September 2007 (UTC)
I was disappointed to find no remarks regarding the distribution of the solar wind. It seems likely that it is either highly irregular and unpredictable or focused about the ecliptlic plane. Francis of Hochbergm 8/2/08 -- Francis of Hochberg ( talk) 16:47, 2 August 2008 (UTC)
I think that interplanetary medium is basically a fork article that doesn't mention anything not in this article. I think this article could safely swallow it. Serendi pod ous 16:53, 3 August 2008 (UTC)
with Heliosphere? Serendi pod ous 13:16, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
Ions. So can someone provide a list of ions and their relative abundance/flux in the solar wind? What it is. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.49.113.189 ( talk) 03:39, 14 January 2009 (UTC)
Energy. The 2nd sentence states that the electron energies are on the order of "10-100 eV". That sounds too low, since it goes on to say that that these particles needed "high kinetic energy to escape the sun's gravitation. So I think the energies should at least be into the kilo electron Volt range. maybe 10-200 keV? Jdagius ( talk) 00:09, 29 August 2010 (UTC)
No. Average solar wind speed is around 450km/s, between 400 and 800km/s depending on fast or slow solar wind. Ion temperature is about 20-200 kilokelvins. Cinetic energy is more or less 2keV (for 430km/s), thermal energy is some tens of eV. So the total energy is between 1.5 and 8 keV. I have no idea where 10-200 eV or keV comes from. I'm changing it. There are some evidence of high energy particles, coming from CMEs or something. But it is a minority, and should not be refereed to as "standard solar wind".
-- Forcimonie ( talk) 11:46, 4 August 2011 (UTC)
I agree thermal energy--at 1 AU-- is on the order of a few 10's of eV. I found 2 simulations that take the Te to be 40 and 10 eV respectively. These correspond to thermal temperatures of 100,000 to 500,000 K. 72.160.11.165 ( talk) 19:37, 8 March 2013 (UTC) Warren Platts
The article on solar sail says "The force due to light pressure is about 5,000 times as strong as that due to solar wind". In this case, how can solar wind be considered responsible for the tail of comets rather than light pressure ? I understand it may be the case for the gas part of the tail if the cross section of an atom (or generally what this gas is made of) is much smaller with respect to light than with respect to elements of the solar wind (electrons and protons); but for dust particles I guess the radiative pressure dominates. Also, a very approximate calculation from this figure together with a value of solar wind speed of 600 km/s, suggests that the total mass loss of the Sun each year due to sun-light through E=mc2 is about 10 times largerr than the one due to solar wind. This would be worth mentioning together with more exact figures. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Spoirier ( talk • contribs) 14:55, 22 June 2009 (UTC)
I read a scientific paper, published way back in 1991, about the interaction between the solar wind and the geomagnetic field. The author seems to think that the length of the solar cycle is related to variations in earth's temperature. I wonder if anyone else has tried to correlate solar activity and things like cloud formation. -- Uncle Ed ( talk) 18:48, 22 February 2010 (UTC)
Although I don't have access to the Birkeland paper referenced in [2], I believe (based on comments in "Rethinking the History of Solar Wind Studies: Eddington's Analysis of Comet Morehouse") that the sentence should read:
-- Kmote ( talk) 20:29, 17 May 2011 (UTC)
"The Sun's corona, or extended outer layer, is a region of plasma that is heated to over a million degrees Celsius. As a result of thermal collisions, the particles within the inner corona have a range and distribution of speeds described by a Maxwellian distribution." What is supposed to be a thermal collision? I guess is that collisions are due to thermal heating, but imho stated like that is quite unclear.-- 79.20.34.174 ( talk) 09:44, 19 December 2011 (UTC)
We need to say more about the solar cycle and sunspots. The solar wind varies--in density, velocity, temperature, and magnetic field properties--with the solar cycle. [5] -- Uncle Ed ( talk) 06:02, 4 February 2012 (UTC)
Agreed. A section on the time scales of variation of the solar wind is required. These would range from seconds/minutes due to turbulent eddies, through days and structures such as corotating interaction regions (CIRs) resulting from solar rotation, to solar cycle variations and centennial/millennial variations. I'm happy to start putting this together if no-one objects? Heliophysics ( talk) 13:33, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
Early in the article, it is mentioned that the solar wind is comprised of Protons and Electrons.
In the "Planetary surfaces" section it ends with "enriched in atomic nuclei deposited from the solar wind".
My question is - where did the neutrons come from? I am unclear as to whether there is the assumption that some electrons merge with protons to create neutrons. Or whether the solar wind strips electrons off of ordinary matter, leaving atomic nuclei behind.
Or are neutrons part of the solar wind to begin with? If not, why not - is there something about charge that causes the initial acceleration?
Or possibly there is something understood but not directly presented here.
pcG PcGnome ( talk) 07:27, 23 August 2012 (UTC)
"Ions" is an incomplete answer. Ions are charged particles. What kind of charged particles? Electrons? Protons? Alpha particles? He+? muons? what? 74.82.132.35 ( talk) 20:06, 30 January 2013 (UTC)
The usage of Stellar Wind ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) is under discussion, see talk:Stellar Wind (code name) -- 70.50.148.122 ( talk) 06:52, 26 January 2014 (UTC)
The usage of the word in the second paragraph seems silly at best, saying a few hundred miles an hour and then immediately after claiming a million. It also has little or even ambiguous relevance in space as "supersonic" on Venus is certainly different than on Earth.
129.130.41.55 ( talk) 22:10, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Solar wind/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.
Overall I agree with the B-rating but not with the Mid-importance (I changed it to High). Extrasolar planet, for example, is a High-importance article and I think solar wind should have a similar importance. Concerning the rating, first stellar wind should not link here. Also, the general section of properties (the subsection are fine, I believe) need work. For example, the composition is confusing. I have no clue where the 200 to 889 km/s speed comes from. USferdinand 00:53, 2 February 2007 (UTC) |
Last edited at 00:53, 2 February 2007 (UTC). Substituted at 06:28, 30 April 2016 (UTC)
I'm not seeing this covered in the article, at all. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 23:46, 5 May 2016 (UTC)
The Poulos article has major advancements in solar wind, solar activity and climate variability. Instead of deleting the references one could critisise if he has any critics. This theory is out since 2005 in earlier texts and has had no refutations yet. It only has strict mathematical proof. Kadefe ( talk) 10:44, 20 May 2016 (UTC)
There is zero chance that this article is ever going to be used as a reference in Wikipedia. I suggest you find some better way to contribute to the project. -- JBL ( talk) 15:45, 21 May 2016 (UTC)
How's that, I admire your arguments. Kadefe ( talk) 17:25, 21 May 2016 (UTC)
Surprised to find nothing about the composition of the solar wind (or can't find it if it is mentioned). It consists of protons largely - and 8% of alpha particles - so hydrogen and helium nuclei. But it also has trace amounts of other elements. See this summary from Stanford university [6]
"The composition of the solar wind is a mixture of materials found in the solar plasma, composed of ionized hydrogen (electrons and protons) with an 8% component of helium (alpha particles) and trace amounts of heavy ions and atomic nuclei: C, N, O, Ne, Mg, Si, S, and Fe ripped apart by heating of the Sun's outer atmosphere, that is, the corona (Feldman et al., 1998).
SOHO also identified traces of some elements for the first time such as P, Ti, Cr and Ni and an assortment of solar wind isotopes identified for the first time: Fe 54 and 56; Ni 58,60,62 (Galvin, 1996)!
Perhaps this could be mentioned in the article if it's not included, or highlighted? The helium 3 in the solar wind also seems worth mentioning, because of the ideas of helium 3 implanted in the lunar regolith, if anyone knows what they are. Robert Walker ( talk) 06:07, 26 December 2016 (UTC)
At a distance of more than a few solar radii from the Sun, the solar wind is supersonic and reaches speeds of 250 to 750 kilometers per second. [1]
At a distance of more than a few solar radii from the Sun, the solar wind reaches speeds of 250 to 750 kilometers per second and is supersonic, [1] meaning it moves faster than the speed of the fast magnetosonic wave. citation needed
References
Heliospheric current sheet says "The solar wind is guided by the Sun's magnetic field and hence largely emanates from the polar regions of the Sun;" but it does not seem to be mentioned in this article. What is known about the properties of the solar wind away from the ecliptic or the suns equator ? - Rod57 ( talk) 17:59, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified 2 external links on Solar wind. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
This message was posted before February 2018.
After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than
regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors
have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the
RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{
source check}}
(last update: 5 June 2024).
Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot ( Report bug) 06:13, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
Sun radius : Earth orbit radius yields around 0.0043 or sth. Surface goes square so we have 50.000 times as much mass density of solar wind on Sun surface. exact values to our knowledge? Wikistallion ( talk) 19:16, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
"Solar wind" is just the term we use to refer to stellar wind caused by our star. We don't make independent articles for all terms of this type, so why this one? 199.45.195.249 ( talk) 01:43, 12 May 2024 (UTC)