Announcement

Time and Place: 9:00---11:00, March 18, 2015. Earth Hall on the fourth floor of JiuZhang Building, the National Space Science Center.

Lecturer: Dr. Lou-Chuang Lee, Academician of Academia Sinica,

More Information: The solar-terrestrial system consists of many neighboring physical regions, which include the photosphere, solar corona, solar wind, magnetosphere, ionosphere, atmosphere, lithosphere and interstellar medium. The electrodynamic coupling among neighboring regions leads to the generation of many observed natural phenomena. The following important electrodynamic coupling processes will be presented and reviewed in the talk:

(a) The plasma shear flows in the solar photosphere lead to the formation and eruption of solar prominence. (b) The coupling between solar wind and magnetosphere through magnetic reconnection and kinetic Alfven waves (KAWs) leads to the transport of particles and energy from the solar wind to magnetosphere. (c) The solar wind –magnetosphere-ionosphere coupling leads to magnetospheric substorms, auroras and auroral kilometric radiation. (d) The electric coupling among lithosphere, atmosphere and ionosphere may lead to total electron content (TEC) variations and formation of nighttime plasma bubbles in the ionosphere. The stressed-rock in the lithosphere can generate currents before earthquake and acts as a dynamo to provide currents for the lithosphere-atmosphere-ionosphere coupling. (e) The coupling of heliosphere to the interstellar medium leads to the formation of termination shock, heliosheath and heliopause as observed by Voyager 1 and 2.