A severe solar storm recently caused colorful auroras to appear in states much farther south than usual.
As the sun nears solar maximum — the peak in its 11-year cycle, expected this year — it becomes more active, and researchers have observed increasingly intense solar flares erupting from the fiery orb.
Increased solar activity causes auroras that dance around Earth’s poles, known as the northern lights, or aurora borealis, and southern lights, or aurora australis. When the energized particles from coronal mass ejections reach Earth’s magnetic field, they interact with gases in the atmosphere to create those different colored lights in the sky.
Here are some of the stories that made headlines over the past week, as well as some photos that caught our eye.
