The Electric Universe and the Thunderbolts Project: Interpreting the Cosmos

Kristian Olaf Bernhard Birkeland (13 December 1867 – 15 June 1917):  In 1908 Norwegian explorer Kristian Birkeland discovered that electromagnetic fluctuations caused by solar winds were the cause of the Aurora Borealis (Northern Lights).  This view was scorned by other researchers, and the established hypothesis rejected his claim, therefore by consensus the experts agreed that the phenomenon was caused by atmospheric pressure gradients affecting the magnetic field, which in-turn caused the Aurora Borealis lights.   but in 1967 a satellite, launched into the auroral region, showed that the currents posited by Birkeland existed. In honour of him and his theory these currents are named Birkeland currents.  The Birkeland current is a set of currents that flow along geomagnetic field lines connecting the Earth’s magnetosphere to the Earth's high latitude ionosphere. In the Earth’s magnetosphere, the currents are driven by the solar wind and interplanetary magnetic field and by bulk motions of plasma through the magnetosphere (convection indirectly driven by the interplanetary environment). 

Professor Emeritus of the Alfvén Laboratory in Sweden, Carl-Gunne Fälthammar wrote "A reason why Birkeland currents are particularly interesting is that, in the plasma forced to carry them, they cause a number of plasma physical processes to occur (waves, instabilities, fine structure formation). These in turn lead to consequences such as acceleration of charged particles, both positive and negative, and element separation (such as preferential ejection of oxygen ions). Both of these classes of phenomena should have a general astrophysical interest far beyond that of understanding the space environment of our own Earth."