Once in a millennium, the Sun bombards us really well. Then the protective ozone layer can suffer.
The summary is made by artificial intelligence and checked by a human.
As the Earth’s magnetic field weakens, the Sun’s particle eruption can cause serious consequences.
The effect can last up to six years and increase DNA damage.
The researchers wondered whether the weak magnetic field, together with the activity of the Sun, influenced the development of life on Earth.
Strong sun exposure can significantly increase the risk of skin cancer and eye damage.
In a period of weak magnetic field, the effect could last as long as six years. It would increase DNA damage caused by UV radiation on the side, says a new study.
This year, the sun has been at its most active in 20 years. It has thrown the solar wind, i.e. the ionized matter of its gas ring called the corona, towards the Earth with extraordinary force.
You don’t have to travel to Lapland to see the northern lights, but the phenomenon has become famous as well In the sky of Helsinki and further south in Europe.
Approximately once a millennium, the Sun hits us with a force many thousand times greater. The last time this happened was around 993.
Fortunately, Earth has an effective shield against bombardment: the magnetic field surrounding our planet.
However, the strength of the protective shield varies. There are periods in the history of the earth when the earth’s geomagnetic field has been weakened or even non-existent. Then the Earth is more susceptible to the Sun’s vibrations.
If an extreme particle eruption happened to strike just when the magnetic field is weak, the consequences would be serious, according to the researchers.
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If an extreme particle eruption happened to strike just when the magnetic field is weak, the consequences would be serious, according to the researchers.
A particle eruption could cause a chemical chain reaction in the atmosphere that destroys ozone. As a result, ozone could be destroyed in significant amounts, and the effect could last for years.
Normally, ozone protects us from the Sun’s harmful ultraviolet radiation. The researchers estimated that as a result of ozone depletion, UV levels would increase by 25 percent. It would probably also have effects on the climate.
A major solar flare would have effects even if the geomagnetic field were at its current level. Even so, ozone levels could decrease for about a year and UV levels could increase.
The sun is constantly releasing particles into space. The surface of the sun is only 6,000 degrees Celsius. However, its gas ring, or the so-called Corona, is a million degrees.
Researchers according to, the combination of a weak magnetic field and a strong particle eruption is not necessarily rare at all – at least if the matter is looked at in a geological time span.
The researchers wondered whether the combination could have influenced extinctions and, on the one hand, the development of life on Earth.
The last time the magnetic field weakened was about 42,000 years ago. The phase lasted approximately a thousand years. Around the same time, the last Neanderthals in Europe became extinct and many large marsupials, such as giant wombats and kangaroos, met their end in Australia.
A weak magnetic field has also been connected to much more significant leaps in the history of life. Multicellular life forms evolved after a 26 million year weak magnetic period, about 565 million years ago.
The low magnetism and high UV levels are also linked to the huge diversification of life during the Cambrian period 539 million years ago. That’s when sea animals developed their first eyes, and they got a hard shell for protection.
It is possible that these features evolved to detect and protect against UV radiation.
The influence of the sun’s activity and the weak magnetic field on the development of life has only just begun to be mapped, and there is plenty to research on the subject.
Research appeared in the Pnas science publication at the beginning of July.