* Astronomy

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RE: IBEX Mission

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Solar Scientists Use 'Magnetic Mirror Effect' to Reproduce IBEX Observation

Ever since NASA's Interstellar Boundary Explorer, or IBEX, mission scientists released the first comprehensive sky map of our solar system's edge in particles, solar physicists have been busy revising their models to account for the discovery of a narrow "ribbon" of bright emission that was completely unexpected and not predicted by any model at the time.
Further study by a team of scientists funded through NASA's Heliophysics Guest Investigator program has produced a revised model that explains and closely reproduces the IBEX result by incorporating a single new effect into an existing model. The new effect, put forward by the IBEX team soon after sighting of the ribbon, is that the magnetic field surrounding our solar system - called the local galactic magnetic field - acts like a mirror for the particles that IBEX sees.
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Listen to Dr. Eric Christian, IBEX Program Scientist, on the Adler Planetarium's "Adler Night & Day" podcast, Episode 74 - November 10, 2009.

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A modest spacecraft designed at the Southwest Research Institute is yielding the first all-sky maps about the heliosphere, which protects our solar system from deadly galactic cosmic rays.

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NASA IBEX Science Update

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IBEX Mission

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IBEX Reveals Bright Ribbon Feature

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First IBEX maps reveal fascinating interactions occurring at the edge of the solar system

IBEX simultaneously creates 14 maps of the sky at different energies. This animation shows several different maps, revealing an unexpectedly bright ribbon-like emission in each.

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Animation courtesy of Southwest Research Institute.

Accurate timing of the incoming ENAs allows the IBEX team to obtain a higher resolution in the latitudinal direction. The inset at right shows some of the fine detail of the ribbon.

Download as a file suitable for publication quality printing. Photo courtesy Southwest Research Institute.

This image illustrates one possible explanation for the bright ribbon of emission seen in the IBEX map. The galactic magnetic field shapes the heliosphere as it drapes over it. The ribbon appears to trace the area where the magnetic field is most parallel to the surface of the heliosphere (the heliopause).

Download as a file suitable for publication quality printing. Photo courtesy Southwest Research Institute

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IBEX Explores Galactic Frontier, Releases First-Ever All-Sky Map
NASA's Interstellar Boundary Explorer, or IBEX, spacecraft has made it possible for scientists to construct the first comprehensive sky map of our solar system and its location in the Milky Way galaxy. The new view will change the way researchers view and study the interaction between our galaxy and sun.

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IBEX All-Sky Map

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First IBEX maps reveal fascinating interactions occurring at the edge of the solar system
The first all-sky maps developed by NASA's Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) spacecraft, the first mission to examine the global interactions occurring at the edge of the solar system, reveal surprising and intense interactions between our home in the galaxy and interstellar space.

"The IBEX results are truly remarkable, with emissions not resembling any of the current theories or models of this never-before-seen region. We expected to see small, gradual spatial variations at the interstellar boundary, some ten billion miles away. However, IBEX is showing us a very narrow ribbon that is two to three times brighter than anything else in the sky" - Dr. David J. McComas, IBEX principal investigator and assistant vice president of the Space Science and Engineering Division at Southwest Research Institute.

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Glimpses of Solar System's edge
The flow of particles into our solar neighbourhood is uneven
The first results from Nasa's Interstellar Boundary Explorer (Ibex) spacecraft have shown unexpected features at our Solar System's edge.
Ibex was launched nearly one year ago to map the heliosphere, the region of space defined by the extent of our Sun's solar wind.
Ibex's first glimpses show that the heliosphere is not shaped as many astronomers have believed.

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La Nasa nous éclaire sur les mystères du système solaire
La sonde Ibex apporte un nouvel éclairage des confins mystérieux du système solaire : elle permet de réaliser les premières cartes de la zone frontalière avec l'espace interstellaire, a révélé jeudi la Nasa.

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