This is a drawing of the Earth's magnetosphere. The plasma sheet is highlighted in yellow.
Click on image for full size
The Plasma Sheet
The
plasma sheet is just that, a sheet of
plasma. It is much thicker than a sheet of paper though! In fact, it is much thicker than the distance through the middle of the Earth!
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Plasma is known as the fourth state of matter. The other three states are solid, liquid and gas.Almost everything is made up of atoms (your dog, your science book, this computer...). The atom has a nucleus
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The lobes of the magnetosphere are a huge area between the magnetopause and the plasma sheet.
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Jupiter's magnetosphere is very pointed and bullet-shaped, as shown in this picture, because of the nature of how it is created. The magnetosphere has many parts, such as the bow shock, magnetospheath,
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A magnetosphere has many parts, such as the bow shock, magnetosheath, magnetotail, plasmasheet, lobes, plasmasphere, radiation belts and many electric currents. Particles in the magnetosphere cause aurora
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AU stands for Astronomical Units. It is an easy way to measure large distances in space. It is the distance between the Earth and the Sun, which is about 93 million miles. For really big distances, we
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The solar wind is formed as the Sun's top layer blows off into space. It carries magnetic fields still attached to the Sun. Streams appear to flow into space as if they are spiraling out from the Sun,
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For a planet to be affected by a blob of material being ejected by the sun, the planet must be in the path of the blob, as shown in this picture. The Earth and its magnetosphere are shown in the bottom
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