NATS 1570 Lecture 5: Lecture 5
7 Mar 2017
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Document Summary
Earth"s magnetic field extends out 100,000"s of kilometers from the surface of earth. The magnetic poles do no coincide with the axis of rotation, but they tend to drift around and can reverse themselves entirely. (we see evidence of these changes in something called seafloor stripping). The magnetic field is important as it diverts most of the high energy ionizes particles of the solar wind away from earth(image courtesy nasa) Some of the particles can flow along the magnetic field lines at the poles to interact with our atmosphere and this produces the northern lights. The magnetic field is produced in earth"s iron nickel core. The core is metallic, and at high temperatures this metal will be charged. The spinning of a charged particle produced a magnetic field. As time passes the magnetic field changes. What we call sea floor stripping, seen on the floor of the atlantic, we can tell that the.
