Earth Sun ID: 20141

THEMIS Sees Magnetic Reconnection

Animations by Walt Feimer Released on July 24, 2008

THEMIS observations confirm for the first time that magnetic reconnection in the magnetotail triggers the onset of substorms. Substorms are the sudden violent eruptions of space weather that release solar energy trapped in the Earth's magnetic field.

Animation Credits

Walt Feimer (HTSI): Lead Animator
Vassilis Angelopoulos (University of California at Berkeley): Scientist

Please give credit for this item to:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Conceptual Image Lab

Short URL to share this page:
https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/20141

Mission:
THEMIS

Data Used:
THEMIS
Note: While we identify the data sets used in these visualizations, we do not store any further details nor the data sets themselves on our site.

This item is part of this series:
Auroral Substorms - the View from Space

Keywords:
SVS >> HDTV
SVS >> Magnetic Reconnection
SVS >> THEMIS
NASA Science >> Earth
NASA Science >> Sun
GCMD >> Earth Science >> Sun-earth Interactions >> Ionosphere/Magnetosphere Dynamics >> Aurorae

GCMD keywords can be found on the Internet with the following citation: Olsen, L.M., G. Major, K. Shein, J. Scialdone, S. Ritz, T. Stevens, M. Morahan, A. Aleman, R. Vogel, S. Leicester, H. Weir, M. Meaux, S. Grebas, C.Solomon, M. Holland, T. Northcutt, R. A. Restrepo, R. Bilodeau, 2013. NASA/Global Change Master Directory (GCMD) Earth Science Keywords. Version 8.0.0.0.0