Collaborate Disseminate
Imagine taking a significant amount of metals and other materials out of the Earth’s crust and scattering it into the atmosphere from space. This is effectively what we have been …read more Continue reading Will Large Satellite Constellations Affect Earth’s Magnetic Field?
The solar wind is a constant feature of the solar system – except on Christmas Day 2022 when it suddenly vanished completely. The odd event was detected by a NASA spacecraft orbiting Mars, which found that the Red Planet’s magnetosphere tripled in size… Continue reading Solar wind vanishes completely, causing Mars’ magnetosphere to swell
The Earth’s ionosphere is the ionized upper part of the atmosphere, and it’s also the most dynamic as it swells and ebbs depending on whether it’s exposed to the Sun …read more Continue reading Ham Radio Operators’ Ionospheric Science During The Solar Eclipse
Imagine what it must have been like for the first human to witness an aurora. It took a while for our species to migrate from its equatorial birthplace to latitudes where auroras are common, so it was a fairly recent event geologically speaking. Still, that first time seeing the shimmers …read more
The two countries were responsible for disrupting the planet’s ionosphere in a series of experiments this June. Continue reading Chinese and Russian Scientists Teamed Up to Manipulate the Earth’s Atmosphere
Like any complex topic, electromagnetic theory has its own vocabulary. When speaking about dielectrics we may refer to their permittivity, and discussions on magnetic circuits might find terms like reluctance and inductance bandied about. At a more practical level, a ham radio operator might discuss the impedance of the coaxial cable used to send signals to an antenna that will then be bounced off the ionosphere for long-range communications.
It’s everyday stuff to most of us, but none of this vocabulary would exist if it hadn’t been for Oliver Heaviside, the brilliant but challenging self-taught British electrical engineer and …read more
Continue reading Oliver Heaviside: Rags to Recognition, to Madness
A new study confirms that Steve is not generated by particle precipitation. So what is powering this skyglow? Continue reading ‘Steve’ Is a Radiant Purple Sky Ribbon That Defies Explanation
Recent developments on the world political stage have brought the destructive potential of electromagnetic pulses (EMP) to the fore, and people seem to have internalized the threat posed by a single thermonuclear weapon. It’s common knowledge that one bomb deployed at a high enough altitude can cause a rapid and powerful pulse of electrical and magnetic fields capable of destroying everything electrical on the ground below, sending civilization back to the 1800s in the blink of an eye.
Things are rarely as simple as the media portray, of course, and this is especially true when a phenomenon with complex physics …read more
We live in an electromagnetic soup, bombarded by wavelengths from DC to daylight and beyond. A lot of it is of our own making, especially further up the spectrum where wavelengths are short enough for the bandwidth needed for things like WiFi and cell phones. But long before humans figured out how to make their own electromagnetic ripples, the Earth was singing songs at the low end of the spectrum. The very low frequency (VLF) band abounds with interesting natural emissions, and listening to these Earth sounds can be quite a treat.
The VLF band is roughly …read more
Continue reading Sferics, Whistlers, and the Dawn Chorus: Listening to Earth Music on VLF
In Europe, the GRAVES radar station beams a signal on 143.050 MHz almost straight up to detect and track satellites and space junk. That means you will generally not hear any signal from the station. However, [DK8OK] shows how you can–if you are in Europe–listen for reflections from the powerful radar. The reflections can come from airplanes, meteors, or spacecraft. You can see a video from [way1888] showing the result of the recent Perseid meteor shower.
Using a software-defined radio receiver, [DK8OK] tunes slightly off frequency and waits for reflections to appear in the waterfall. In addition to observing the …read more
Continue reading Sorry US; Europeans Listen to Space with GRAVES
