Aurora Borealis or The northern lights is one of the moust unusual and beautiful wonder of nature.It is a spectacle when fluorescent light dancing in night sky.
The aurora was named after the Roman goddess of dawn, and was long thought to be produced by sunlight reflected from polar snow and ice, or refracted light much like rainbows. Auroras are caused by high energy particles from the solar wind that is trapped in the Earth's magnetic field . As these particles spiral back and forth along the magnetic field lines, they come down into the atmosphere near the north and south magnetic poles where the magnetic field lines disappear into the body of the Earth. The delicate colors are caused by energetic electrons colliding with oxygen and nitrogen molecules in the atmosphere. This excites the molecules, and when they decay from the excited states they emit the light that we see in the aurora.
Alaska is by far the best place in the USA to see northern lights that too in the months of September and March, as the Earth is in the zone of maximum solar activity during that period. The aurora is most active late at night or early in the morning, when the sky is clear and the air chilly.
Aurora-Borealis from space
Aurora-Borealis painting by Jan Andersen
Aurora-Borealis from space
