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Concept
Heliophysics
Summary
Heliophysics (from the prefix "helio", from Attic Greek hḗlios, meaning Sun, and the noun "physics": the science of matter and energy and their interactions) is the physics of the Sun and its connection with the Solar System. NASA defines heliophysics as "(1) the comprehensive new term for the science of the Sun - Solar System Connection, (2) the exploration, discovery, and understanding of Earth's space environment, and (3) the system science that unites all of the linked phenomena in the region of the cosmos influenced by a star like our Sun."
Heliophysics concentrates on the Sun's effects on Earth and other bodies within the Solar System, as well as the changing conditions in space. It is primarily concerned with the magnetosphere, ionosphere, thermosphere, mesosphere, and upper atmosphere of the Earth and other planets. Heliophysics combines the science of the Sun, corona, heliosphere and geospace, and encompasses a wide variety of astronomical phenomena, including "cosmic rays and particle acceleration, space weather and radiation, dust and magnetic reconnection, nuclear energy generation and internal solar dynamics, solar activity and stellar magnetic fields, aeronomy and space plasmas, magnetic fields and global change", and the interactions of the Solar System with the Milky Way Galaxy.
Term “heliophysics” (Russian: “гелиофизика”) was widely used in Russian-language scientific literature. The Great Soviet Encyclopedia third edition (1969—1978) defines “Heliophysics” as “[...] a division of astrophysics that studies physics of the Sun". In 1990, the Higher Attestation Commission, responsible for the advanced academic degrees in Soviet Union and later in Russia and the Former Soviet Union, established a new specialty “Heliophysics and physics of solar system”. In English-language scientific literature prior to about 2002, the term heliophysics was sporadically used to describe the study of the "physics of the Sun". As such it was a direct translation from the French "héliophysique" and the Russian "гелиофизика".
Official source
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