Discovering a previously unknown role for a source of magnetic fields
Friday, October 19, 2018 - 10:30
in Astronomy & Space
Magnetic forces ripple throughout the universe, from the fields surrounding planets to the gasses filling galaxies, and can be launched by a phenomenon called the Biermann battery effect. Now scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) have found that this phenomenon may not only generate magnetic fields, but can sever them to trigger magnetic reconnection—a remarkable and surprising discovery.