Researchers find evidence of Zwan-Wolf effect on Mars
Using data from the NASA spacecraft MAVEN, a team at West Virginia University have found evidence of the atmosphere of planets being protected from solar winds, even without strong magnetic fields, also known as the Zwan-Wolf effect. The Zwan-Wolf effect was first described in 1976 and had only been observed in planetary magnetospheres, not in atmospheres. But findings reported in Nature Communications have observed the effect in Mars’ atmosphere, bringing new understanding to how our Sun interacts with planetary bodies in our solar system. The sun emits a continuous flow of plasma, known as solar wind. When this plasma flow encounters large objects like planets or comets, it is deflected around them, similar to the flow of water around a rock in a stream. “However,” said Christopher Fowler, planetary scientist at West Virginia University, “because the water in that stream is relatively dense, physical collisions between water molecules bumping into each other and the rock determine how the water is diverted. In contrast, the environment in space is so tenuous that solar wind particles do …
