GREENBELT, Md., Feb. 20 (UPI) -- A common space weather phenomenon on the outskirts of Earth's magnetic bubble has larger -- much larger -- repercussions for Venus, NASA scientists say. <\/p>\n
Giant explosions called hot flow anomalies in the solar wind can be so large when they encounter Venus they're bigger than the entire planet can happen multiple times a day, they said. <\/p>\n
\"Not only are they gigantic,\" Glyn Collinson, a space scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., said, \"but as Venus doesn't have a magnetic field to protect itself, the hot flow anomalies happen right on top of the planet. They could swallow the planet whole.\" <\/p>\n
Collinson is the lead author of a paper based on observations from the European Space Agency's Venus Express, showing just how large and how frequent this kind of space weather is at Venus. <\/p>\n
Earth is protected from the constant streaming solar wind of radiation by its magnetic bubble -- the magnetosphere -- while Venus, a barren, inhospitable planet with an atmosphere so dense spacecraft landing there are crushed within hours, Venus has no such magnetic protection. <\/p>\n
At Earth, hot flow anomalies do not make it inside the magnetosphere, whereas on Venus they can create dramatic planet-scale disruptions, possibly sucking the planet's upper atmosphere up and away from the surface, the scientists said. <\/p>\n
That suggests Earth without its magnetic field might be as barren and lifeless as Venus, they said. <\/p>\n
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Space weather explosions on Venus engulf entire planet<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" GREENBELT, Md., Feb. 20 (UPI) -- A common space weather phenomenon on the outskirts of Earth's magnetic bubble has larger -- much larger -- repercussions for Venus, NASA scientists say. Continue reading