From the UK Telegraph – source link
The protective bubble around the sun that helps to shield the Earth from harmful interstellar radiation is shrinking and getting weaker, NASA scientists have warned.
By Richard Gray, Science Correspondent
Last Updated: 9:23AM BST 19 Oct 2008
New data has revealed that the heliosphere, the protective shield of energy that surrounds our solar system, has weakened by 25 per cent over the past decade and is now at it lowest level since the space race began 50 years ago.
Scientists are baffled at what could be causing the barrier to shrink in this way and are to launch mission to study the heliosphere.
The Interstellar Boundary Explorer, or IBEX, will be launched from an aircraft on Sunday on a Pegasus rocket into an orbit 150,000 miles above the Earth where it will “listen” for the shock wave that forms as our solar system meets the interstellar radiation.
Dr Nathan Schwadron, co-investigator on the IBEX mission at Boston University, said: “The interstellar medium, which is part of the galaxy as a whole, is actually quite a harsh environment. There is a very high energy galactic radiation that is dangerous to living things.
“Around 90 per cent of the galactic cosmic radiation is deflected by our heliosphere, so the boundary protects us from this harsh galactic environment.”
The heliosphere is created by the solar wind, a combination of electrically charged particles and magnetic fields that emanate a more than a million miles an hour from the sun, meet the intergalactic gas that fills the gaps in space between solar systems.
At the boundary where they meet a shock wave is formed that deflects interstellar radiation around the solar system as it travels through the galaxy.
The scientists hope the IBEX mission will allow them to gain a better understanding of what happens at this boundary and help them predict what protection it will offer in the future.
Without the heliosphere the harmful intergalactic cosmic radiation would make life on Earth almost impossible by destroying DNA and making the climate uninhabitable.
Measurements made by the Ulysses deep space probe, which was launched in 1990 to orbit the sun, have shown that the pressure created inside the heliosphere by the solar wind has been decreasing.
Dr David McComas, principal investigator on the IBEX mission, said: “It is a fascinating interaction that our sun has with the galaxy surrounding us. This million mile an hour wind inflates this protective bubble that keeps us safe from intergalactic cosmic rays.
“With less pressure on the inside, the interaction at the boundaries becomes weaker and the heliosphere as a whole gets smaller.”
If the heliosphere continues to weaken, scientists fear that the amount of cosmic radiation reaching the inner parts of our solar system, including Earth, will increase.
This could result in growing levels of disruption to electrical equipment, damage satellites and potentially even harm life on Earth.
But Dr McComas added that it was still unclear exactly what would happen if the heliosphere continued to weaken or what even what the timescale for changes in the heliosphere are.
He said: “There is no imminent danger, but it is hard to know what the future holds. Certainly if the solar wind pressure was to continue to go down and the heliosphere were to almost evaporate then we would be in this sea of galactic cosmic rays. That could have some large effects.
“It is likely that there are natural variations in solar wind pressure and over time it will either stabilise or start going back up.”
(hat tip to Dvid Gladstone)
nobwainer (00:46:21) :
Nicely sidestepped…..so when the next warm PDO comes around…where will the heat come from?….has to come from somewhere.
The Sun shines every day heating the oceans which stores the heat for future use.
Robert Bateman (03:46:08) :
I can still see most of what Mt. Wilson can see, with pretty much the same seeing as they have.
Perhaps one day I’ll come up [from Petaluma] to visit your observatory…
Wouldn’t that be like hunting deer at night with a flashlight? That’s illegal and can merit you a hefty fine and even jail time. But then such rules are only for the common person. Certainly not for corporations and government bodies.
Leif, I remember when we were little filling the cattle trough with water to use as a swimming pool. If we didn’t get in right away; and mind you, this water came from the well and it took our breath away and made our lips turn blue; it turned into a hot tub soon enough.
lgl (12:33:01) :
Carsten
wow, gjett om jeg har lett etter en slik simulator.
Svaret er ja, men se under.
Is this all about the solar system’s orbit around the center of the galaxy?
No, it has nothing to do with the solar system’s orbit around the center of the galaxy. It shows the sun’s movements near the center of the solar system, as it reacts to the gravitational forces of the planets. It is nothing new, but quite illustrative to what is actually going on. To me it is/was also a tool for investigating potential correlations with solar activity. So far I have found none.
Carsten Arnholm, Norway (07:42:05) :
It [the simulator] is nothing new, but quite illustrative to what is actually going on.
No, it actually gets the distances [and therefore very likely other things] wrong.
I’m in the process of remodelling the 16″ Newt for some faster integration times.
Love those distant galaxies forming on the downloads.
You are welcome any time. I didn’t know you were in the Bay Area, it’s a small world indeed..
Can you get my email off this list?
Robert Bateman (10:26:07) :
Can you get my email off this list?
No, but you can send it to me leif@leif.org
Check out my son’s stuff at http://www.leif.org/mikael/
He once had of his images [of the veil nebula] on APOD.
APOD is here http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
Carsten
But aren’t you now back to what Leif usually is calling barycenter nonsense?
If the barycenter was at rest relative to a fixed point in space (if one exists) I would agree that you should not find any trace of the gravitational forces in solar activity, but I find it hard to understand that the situation is not different when the sun is moving very fast having a tremendous linear (over short timespan) momentum.
It’s easier to understand that a wiggling orbit may create turbulence in a star’s ‘atmosphere’. And considering the hugh momentum, how can the gravitation of the planets change the sun’s moving direction?
b t w shouldn’t that change depend on the speed of the barycenter through space, which is not in your model at all, puh .. I need a rest ..
Leif Svalgaard (23:49:08) :
For more:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milankovitch_cycles
Not particularly relevant, but I am pleased that even if indirectly, name of Milutin Milankovic came up, since I spend my academic years in the lecture halls, where some years earlier, he was a professor and the entrance is guarded by statue of Nikola Tesla.
Leif,
Don’t be so hard on him, he did write “illustrative”.
Are you refuting that the sun is moving roughly like these patterns (say within 10%, which is more that good as an illustration)?
And are you refuting that it actually is the barycenter that is moving in a straight line through space (short timespan) and not the sun?
Leif Svalgaard (10:13:54) :
Carsten Arnholm, Norway (07:42:05) :
It [the simulator] is nothing new, but quite illustrative to what is actually going on.
No, it actually gets the distances [and therefore very likely other things] wrong.
Well excuse me, but it does not calculate distances in its present form at all. I don’t know what your problem is.
John Finn (01:45:16) : After following Leif Svalgaard’s arguments both here and on CA I’m even less convinced that a predictable solar/climate link exists. Put it this way if solar activity has a direct influence I don’t expect it to become evident for several decades.
re ‘predictable’: I don’t think we’re very good yet at predicting what the sun will do. But to a certain extent climate can be predicted for given solar changes. That goes back to William Hershel (and NASA identified a solar-activity link to ancient Egyptian records). There’s a good summary IMHO of some of the solar/climate knowledge in Jasper Kirkby’s paper
http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/0804/0804.1938v1.pdf
re ‘several decades’: Maybe, but I think the evidence suggests there can be a faster reaction than that.
John Finn (01:45:16) : that AGW sceptics (skeptics in the US) are less than sceptical about theories which claim to counter AGW.
Human nature being what it is, that applies to both sides, of course. In some cases, in spades. Having read the IPCC report very carefully, I am totally convinced that they have heavily misrepresented the situation. There is remarkably strong empirical evidence of links between sun and climate for which the mechanisms are not yet fully known, which are acknowledged in the IPCC report but then ignored. [Not their only error]. Of all the climate theories, the links between sun and climate via cosmic rays and clouds seem the most promising, but my mind is open to any other theory too.
The other angle that I follow is to see what is/has actually happening/ed (temperatures, ice, etc) and it is extremely difficult to believe that CO2 is driving it. IMHO of course.
Leif Svalgaard (05:49:34) : The Sun shines every day heating the oceans which stores the heat for future use.
Neatly sidestepped again. With more insolation (plus ‘feedbacks’) the oceans warm more, which in time contributes more warmth to the climate. And vice versa. It’s the changes in the sun and climate that we’re talking about.
Carsten Arnholm, Norway (11:52:55) :
Well excuse me, but it does not calculate distances in its present form at all. I don’t know what your problem is.
Well, I apologize for being presumptive without actually checking what it does. The screen-shot says that the simulator shows the orbit of the solar system’s center of mass with respect to the Sun. You need to know where the Earth is [and all the other planets, as well] to calculate where the center of mass is. So, if you calculate where the Earth is you also have the distance to the Sun [you even showed a graph of that]. The definition of the barycenter is sum(r[i]*m[i])/sum(r[i]) over all i, where r is the distance and m the mass. So, you must have calculated all the r[i]s, thus all the distances. Alternatively you could have worked in rectangular coordinates and calculated x, y, and z, but then you also have the distance r = sqrt(x^2+y^2+x^2). In any case the calculated r should be the same as JPL calculates, and I think this whole discussion got started because you from your calculations found a distance that did not conform to the actual distance [as calculated by JPL and as measured with TSI].
lgl (11:23:27) :
Are you refuting that the sun is moving roughly like these patterns (say within 10%, which is more that good as an illustration)?
No, I’m quibbling about the word ‘actually’ which implies that that is how it actually is without 10% [or any other large] slop.
And are you refuting that it actually is the barycenter that is moving in a straight line through space (short timespan) and not the sun?
With a time span short enough everything is moving in a straight line. Assuming the Sun is gravitationally bound to the Galaxy, then the solar system moves under the influence of the gravitational field of the Galaxy [which is almost uniform across the solar system because the solar system is much smaller than the Galaxy]. And a system of bodies acted upon by a uniform force moves as if the force was applied to the center of mass, so the system moves accordingly, thus no need to refute anything.
egrey (14:04:16) :
re ‘predictable’: I don’t think we’re very good yet at predicting what the sun will do.
Yet most people here seems to think that solar activity is on a downslope and thus confidently predict a cooling. So, what do they know [or blatantly just assume] that you don’t.
re ’several decades’: Maybe, but I think the evidence suggests there can be a faster reaction than that.
what evidence? the ‘cooling’ that started a few years ago corresponding to the downslope of solar activity that happens during the declining phase of EVERY sunspot cycle, including the ones 10, 20, 30, etc. years ago?
There is remarkably strong empirical evidence of links between sun and climate
I think here is where we part ways. I’m fairly well versed in this, having studied the field for 40+ years and having carefully read almost all of the serious literature on this [there is non-serious lit. too, e.g. this http://landscheidt.auditblogs.com/papers-by-dr-theodor-landscheidt ] and have not found any of the hundreds of articles [including some of my own, e.g. ‘Solar magnetic sector structure: relation to circulation of the earth’s atmosphere.’ by Wilcox, J. M.; Scherrer, P. H.; Svalgaard, L.; Roberts, W. O.; Olson, R. H. Science, Vol. 180, p. 185-186, 1973] to pass muster. There are no shortage of outrageous claims but no coherent picture has emerged, and certainly not a ‘remarkable’ one.
my mind is open to any other theory too.
And it is not about an open or closed mind. My own has been open to this for decades. I desperately want there to be a sun-climate connection. It would make my skill set much more valuable and grants would be rolling in. But, alas, in the heart of my hearts, if I have to be honest with myself, I cannot, with integrity intact, claim that there is such a linkage. Other people may have come to other conclusions, but I guess we all have own ideas about what is acceptable.
The other angle that I follow is to see what is/has actually happening/ed (temperatures, ice, etc) and it is extremely difficult to believe that CO2 is driving it. IMHO of course.
What bothers [the hell out of] me is that invariably the belief/denial of AGW is woven in with the totally separately and unconnected problem of sun-climate relations.
Leif Svalgaard (05:49:34) : The Sun shines every day heating the oceans which stores the heat for future use.
With more insolation (plus ‘feedbacks’) the oceans warm more, which in time contributes more warmth to the climate. And vice versa. It’s the changes in the sun and climate that we’re talking about.
Sure, and I [and many others] have repeatedly calculated that the warming of 0.1% change of insolation [I note the slight change of wording here – changes of insolation do occur causing glaciations coming and going] or, since you explicitly say ‘changes in the sun’, of TSI would amount to less than a tenth of a degree. The ‘feedback’ [and I shall also use quotes – a sign that none of us know what they are] expected from a warmer world would be negative – more evaporation -> more clouds -> cooling, possibly countered by a positive feedback in that water vapor is a potent greenhouse gas. In any event, no great temp changes is to be expected from a 0.1% change of TSI. And sure enough, it has been very hard to establish a solar cycle effect exceeding 0.1-0.2 degrees [and even that small effect is marginal].
Leif Svalgaard (15:11:08) :
It is hard to be perfect: The definition of the barycenter is sum(r[i]*m[i])/sum(m[i]) over all i.
Carsten Arnholm, Norway
Thanks so much for providing the Solar Sim2, beautiful piece of software, I will use it often.
Teacher, can I go home now? My tummy hurts.
In mathematical language that would be [h(t*r)/tum%] over all s, where h=desire to go home, t=teacher, and r=reading math language, divided by % tummy acid.
Don’t ask me what s means. I can’t remember because my brain has tripped a circuit.
Leif
And a system of bodies acted upon by a uniform force moves as if the force was applied to the center of mass
So it is the barycenter moving in a straight line, i.e the sun is not so it is accelerating. (you know what timespan we are dealing with since this is about solar cycles, and you know I do not mean an exactly straight line)
Turning into black
Rising of the dead
The dying has begun
Beneath a dying sun
lgl (23:38:54) :
So it is the barycenter moving in a straight line, i.e the sun is not so it is accelerating.
and so is the Earth in its orbit, and the space station in its orbit around the Earth, and the astronaut on a spacewalk with his lost glove moving alongside, and a man and his dog in an elevator when the cable is cut. They are all in free fall [constantly accelerating], but feel no forces [because every particle is accelerating the same way].
In my view (since it appears there is no agreement and I doubt that there would be one) climate is affected by both: solar cycles and by AGW. To that extent I would like to draw your attention to graph:
http://www.vukcevic.co.uk/mgt.gif
Derivation and properties of ‘Maunder curve’ (Y2) is directly related to solar cycle; see:
http://www.vukcevic.co.uk
and follow link solar current (page3).
It follows that if there is no further increase in AGW then over the next 10 years we can expect global cooling of approx. 0.2-03 degree C from the current global temperatures.
Leif
but feel no forces
This is where I’m falling off the space station. This ever changing direction of the sun’s orbit means it will feel acceleration.