ESA’s Swarm mission has discovered that this seasonal variation of Birkeland currents, strong electric currents in the upper atmosphere, is not the same in the north and south polar regions. Named after Kristian Birkeland, the scientist a century ago who first…
Scientists analyzing data obtained by Swarm trio of satellites have discovered supersonic plasma jets high up in our atmosphere that can push temperatures up to almost 10 000 °C (18 000 °F). The discovery was presented at this week’s Swarm Science…
After three years of collecting data, Swarm mission scientists have produced the highest resolution map of Earth’s lithospheric magnetic field from space to date. The dataset combines measurements from ESA’s Swarm satellites with historical data from the…
US armed forces’ Joint Space Operations Center (JSpOC) has identified a close approach for ESA's Swarm-B satellite forecast to occur at 23:10 UTC on January 25, 2017. The forecast miss distance is just 361 m (1 184 feet), and this triggers a risk above the…
Scientists using data obtained by ESA's Swarm constellation of satellites have discovered a jet stream in the liquid iron part of Earth’s core 3 000 km (1 864 miles) beneath the surface. In addition, Swarm satellite data show that this jet stream is…
ESA's Swarm satellite trio has discovered why GPS navigation systems on low-orbiting satellites sometimes black out when they fly over the equator between Africa and South America. Swarm itself has experienced this anomaly numerous times before its scientists…
A group of experts utilized the data collected by the ESA's SWARM satellites to show how the magnetic field is pulsating, where it's weakening and strengthening, and how fast these changes occur. For the first time, experts have mapped both the changes…
After a year in orbit, the three Swarm satellites have provided a first glimpse inside Earth and started to shed new light on the dynamics of the upper atmosphere – all the way from the ionosphere about 100 km above, through to the outer reaches of our protective
It is known that Earth’s magnetic field has flipped many times throughout the planet’s history. Its dipole magnetic field remains about the same intensity for thousands to millions of years, but for incompletely known reasons it occasionally weakens (such is
The first set of high-resolution results from ESA’s three-satellite Swarm constellation reveals the most recent changes in the magnetic field that protects us from cosmic radiation and charged particles that bombard Earth. Magnetic field is in a permanent…
