In the early morning hours of July 13, a slow-moving coronal mass ejection from the Sun arrived early on its journey to Earth. That afternoon, word spread across social media in Europe, Canada, and the US: there might be aurora tonight. No one knew, however, whether it would last long enough for this part of Earth[…]
by Kasha Patel Reposted from NASA Earth Observatory Every summer in the Northern Hemisphere, electric blue streaks form high in the atmosphere. These seasonal clouds typically lurk about 80 kilometers (50 miles) overhead in the mesosphere around the Arctic, but every once in a while they form at lower latitudes. In 2019, the clouds showed up in places where[…]
Guest post by Vincent Ledvina
Guest post by Aurorasaurus Ambassador Jeremy Kuzub This article is the first of three about how researchers and citizen scientists record and explore years of auroral activity using all-sky cameras, keograms, and software visualizations. What if you could stand under the aurora-filled night sky and watch everything from horizon to horizon, all night, every night,[…]
A message from our founder, Dr. Liz MacDonald On June 10, 2020, there was an organized event to shut down STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) in support of Black Lives Matter. Aurorasaurus participated with a day of reflective practice alongside members of our community and the scientific community (agenda pasted below). We stand firmly[…]
Aurora citizen science often involves gazing at the sky outdoors, but there is a lot of learning and citizen science that can be done from home! In this post, we have compiled some resources for families, students, and aurora enthusiasts. Best of all, we are here for you if you have questions on this material—tweet[…]
In Spring, the Aurorasaurus Reawakens! During Solar Minimum, even Aurorasauruses hibernate a little. But with new funding, Aurorasaurus is coming back with an update! Over the next months, you’ll see updates to our website and tools. This status update is current as of May 1, 2020. Behind the Scenes The mastermind behind this revitalization is[…]
This year’s Ham Radio Science Citizen Investigation (HamSCI) Workshop 2020 took place online, over Zoom and YouTube Live. In this post, we’ll bring you details for how to watch the recorded presentations, summarize Aurorasaurus’ contributions to the presentation lineup, and share lessons learned for getting a conference online with a short turnaround.
A summary of a groundbreaking new paper by Dr. Michael Hunnekuhl and Dr. Liz MacDonald, published in Space Weather with open access: “Early Ground-Based Work by Auroral Pioneer Carl Størmer on the High Altitude Detached Subauroral Arcs now known as STEVE.” In 2018, STEVE took the world by (solar) storm. The quirky little subauroral arc[…]
Each year, Goddard Space Flight Center holds a collegial poster party for scientists and engineers to showcase their ongoing research. One of the award categories is “Best Science as Food.” What better opportunity to try ideas for hands-on education? Aurorasaurus and our colleagues Dr. Anne-Marie Novo-Gradac and Dr. Kevin Novo-Gradac decided to represent the Heliophysics department by coming up[…]
