Deadly flare special move11/9/2023 ![]() ![]() However, an examination of fossil spores from the time of the extinction revealed signs of ultraviolet light damage – suggesting that perhaps an exploding star triggered the extinction.įortunately, there are no supernova candidates close enough to Earth to pose such a threat anytime soon, the study authors reassured. A mass extinction at the end of this period resulted in the death of 70% of Earth’s invertebrates, though scientists are not certain what triggered it. 2020) suspect that the death of a star within 65 light-years of Earth may have done just that about 359 million years ago, at the end of the Devonian Period (416 million to 358 million years ago). The authors of a recent study (published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences in Aug. ![]() ![]() These blasts are many, many times more powerful that solar flares should such an explosion occur sufficiently close to Earth, the dying star could bathe our planet in so much ultraviolet radiation that it strips our protective ozone layer away, making Earth vulnerable to a barrage of charged interstellar particles.ĩ Ideas about black holes that will blow your mind When certain stars run out of fuel and die, they explode in a tremendous supernova that blasts powerful radiation into space for millions of light-years around. Our nearest star may not pose an extinction threat – but scientists suspect that other nearby stars could. "What sort of fluxes would have to strike the Earth to wipe us out? I don't know the answer to that, but obviously, we've never even observed a solar event big enough to have any measurable effects on human health." Star damage "No matter what, flares do not have a significant effect on us here on Earth," Doug Biesecker, a researcher at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Space Weather Prediction Center, told the Stanford Solar Center. If even stronger solar storms battered our planet before this, there is no evidence that they impacted human health either. Still, even the most powerful geomagnetic storm in recorded history - the 1859 Carrington Event - had no noticeable impact on the health of humans or other life on Earth. Satellites and space stations, which orbit beyond the protection of Earth's atmosphere, can also be debilitated by the renegade radiation of CMEs. Some experts fear that a sufficiently large CME could create an " internet apocalypse" by overloading undersea internet cables and leaving parts of the world without web access for weeks or months, though this has not happened yet. Radio and radar systems around the world can black out, and electrical grids may become overloaded and lose power. During such storms, the aurora borealis, typically only seen near the North Pole, can shift down so far that it becomes visible near the equator. However, the biggest, most energetic CMEs can actually compress our planet's magnetic field as they pass, resulting in what's known as a geomagnetic storm.Īs electromagnetic energy from the sun pours into our magnetosphere, atoms and molecules in Earth's atmosphere become electrically charged, creating effects that can be seen around the world. Most CMEs pass over our planet completely undetected by the general public, thanks to Earth's powerful magnetic field, or magnetosphere. Whether or not you've heard of CMEs, you've likely lived through hundreds of them the sun emits anywhere from one CME each week to several a day, depending on where we are in the sun's 11-year cycle of activity, according to NASA. If a flaring sunspot happens to be facing Earth, then any resulting CMEs blast right toward us, typically reaching our planet in anywhere from 15 hours to several days. However, the intense energy of a flare can also heat up nearby gas in the sun's atmosphere, launching enormous blobs of charged particles known as coronal mass ejections (CMEs) out into space. Most energy from a solar flare is radiated away as ultraviolet and X-ray light, Live Science previously reported. ![]()
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