Aurora Forms

Beautiful display of Aurora Borealis or the Northern Lights lit up the sky over a Sami village in Lapland, northern Sweden. When aurora is very active it often displays its most beautiful form known as aurora corona. It appears near the zenith. Its form can appear to boil with motion, its colors can range across the entire spectrum and, when bright, it can easily cast a shadow. Aurora is produced by the collision of charged particles from Earth’s magnetosphere with atoms and molecules of Earth’s atmosphere (at altitudes above 80 km). The particles originate from the Sun and reach the Earth in the stream of solar wind.