According to a new study, the drift of the Earth’s north magnetic pole from Canada to Siberia has influenced the penetration altitudes of charged particles in the mid-high latitudes in the Earth’s magnetosphere. Understanding the behavior of these particles with an electric charge, such as electrons, quarks, protons, and ions that are responsible for the Northern lights or aurora, can better predict space weather and safeguard our satellite systems.
Earth’s magnetic field, a protective shield created by the planet’s core, is quietly changing.
By 2020, it was moving at a surprising speed of about 50 kilometers per year. While this might sound like a minor geographic adjustment, the shift had significant consequences for the way charged particles behaved in space.
In Earth’s magnetosphere, a region called the radiation belts, hold energetic charged particles like protons and electrons. These particles, influenced by Earth’s magnetic field, rotate, bounce, and drift around the planet.
But where these particles end up—and how close they get to Earth—depends on the strength and shape of the magnetic field. Scientists have been trying to investigate how does the movement of the north magnetic pole change the paths of these particles.
Researchers at the Indian Institute of Geomagnetism, an autonomous institute of the Department of Science and Technology (DST), decided to simulate the trajectory of these particles using simulation models.
They simulated three-dimensional relativistic test particles based on the IGRF-13 (International Geomagnetic Reference Field) model, to quantify changes in the altitudes of energetic protons.
But by the year 2020, the story was different. As the north pole shifted toward Siberia, the magnetic field in Canada weakened while the field in Siberia grew stronger.
Such impact of geomagnetic field variations on particle dynamics, have real-world implications. Satellites in polar orbits, which pass through these regions, can experience varying levels of drag (resistive force caused by change in atmospheric density due to heating cause by collision of high energy and atmospheric particles) depending on how deep charged particles penetrate the atmosphere.
The energy these particles deposit can also heat the atmosphere, changing its density and affecting satellite paths.
The magnetosphere is the region of space surrounding Earth where the dominant magnetic field is the magnetic field of Earth, rather than the magnetic field of interplanetary space.
We have evidence of this result from studying one of our closest planetary neighbors, Mars.
Earth’s magnetic field is strongest at the poles and weakest at the equator. The Earth’s magnetic field resembles that of an enormous bar magnet. The field lines emerge from the south pole of the earth and re-enter in the north pole.
Earth’s magnetic field — also known as the geomagnetic field — is generated in our planet’s interior and extends out into space, creating a region known as the magnetosphere.
Without the magnetic field, life on Earth as we know it would not be possible as it shields us all from the constant bombardment by charged particles emitted from the sun — the solar wind. (To learn what happens to a planet when it loses its magnetic field, you only need to look at Mars.)
Earth has two sets of poles, geographic pole and magnetic poles. Each end of the magnet lies relatively close (about 10 degrees) to the geographic North and South poles. Earth’s invisible magnetic field lines travel in a closed, continuous loop and are nearly vertical at each magnetic pole.
Mars could have lived, even without a magnetic field. Mars and Earth were sister planets in many ways, with early similar conditions.
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