What is the Aurora borealls?

Answer 1

Aurora borealis is the fancy name for the Northern Lights. They are usually seen above/below 60 degrees North or South latitude. 60 North is in Alaska, Canada, Norway, Northern Russia and Siberia while 60 degrees South is south of the tip of South America.

The Earth's magnetic field is like a big bar magnet where the field begins to pinch down towards the poles at this latitude. What is interesting here is that these are the same sort of conditions that occur inside particle accelerators producing some interesting atomic reactions.

They can sometimes be seen at less than 60 degrees latitude due to the Sun being more active with such things as CME's or flares. Solar activity which produced the Carrington Event caused unanticipated results that today probably would cripple our electrical grid.

The Northern lights are caused by charged particles from the Solar Wind or Coronal Mass Ejections being directed by the Earth's magnetic field lines towards either the of the Poles based on charge of the particle. When the charged particles reach a height of (ball park) 50-80 miles above the surface at latitudes of 60 degrees North or South, they can strike the atoms of the gases present at that height.

The colors seen in the aurora are a result of the gases primarily oxygen and nitrogen fluorescing much like the actions inside a fluorescent light tube. Oxygen depending on its height in the atmosphere can give off green or red light, while nitrogen can give off blue, violet and purple.

The wavy curtain actions seen is analogous to being on the inside of a car(the Earth) going through a car wash. The car wash (Sun) is spraying out charged particles much like a hose being waved back and forth striking a car wind shield.

if you research NASA, space shuttle, Aurora on a search engine. You can find some interesting pictures and videos and more in depth explanation.