Starlight moves in straight lines, one pass through our galaxy and it is "As intense as starlight" seems to say that our galaxy gives about as much energy to exotic particles moving close to the speed of light, as it gives to the visible light of its billions of stars.Īctually, the source of cosmic rays is probably not quite as intense, becauseĬosmic ray particles can stay around the galaxy much longer than starlight. That does not sound like much, until one remembers what the stars are-distant suns, about a hundred billion of them traveling together in our galaxy, and untold billions in more distant galaxies. The radiation is therefore not intense, giving us about as much energy as Those trapped in the Earth's field, though their overall density is rather small. Individually the cosmic ray ions are much faster and more energetic than They are known as cosmic rays or cosmic radiation. One piece of evidence is a rain of fast ions constantly bombarding Earth, coming from distant space and much more energetic than any found in the magnetosphere. The unexpected answer is that even higher energies seem quite commonplace in the universe. How unusual is such an environment? How does the rest of the universe compare? Are the high-energy ions and electrons of the magnetosphere an exceptional and rare In a nutshell, the magnetosphere is a high-energy environment, where speeds amounting to 1/10 the speed of light are not uncommon. Ring current protons have more, around 20,000 to 100,000 ev, while inner belt protons go higher still, typically 10,000,000 to 100,000,000 ev.
Auroral electrons typically have 1000 to 10,000 ev, as do protons in the magnetotail. The Sun's plasma is much hotter, and that of the magnetosphere is hotter still.
Molecules bounce off each other like billiard balls, with not enough force toĪffect each other's structure by, say, tearing off electrons. We breathe: its molecules have energies around 0.03 ev (electron volt-seeĮnergetic particles) and move as fast as cannonballs, though still quite a bit slower than a typical satellite. The atoms involved in our everyday life are not too energetic.
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