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Our sun not only provides light, it also provides a constant shower of particles, the solar wind, and it has as direct an effect on our lives as sunlight. Without the magnetic field of our earth we would be mercilessly at his mercy. The end of our sun still lies billions of years in the future, yet we have to think more about our everyday life than about the end of life on earth.

In addition, we are exposed to much more direct influences, because our sun causes a lot of turbulence in our system, because it constantly emits solar wind.

It mainly consists of protons and electrons as well as helium nuclei, the so-called alpha particles. Other atomic nuclei and electrically neutral atoms are hardly present.

The solar wind reflects the composition of the nebula from which the solar system was formed. After all, the wind comes from the outer layers of the sun and is not yet interspersed with the heavy elements that are formed as a by-product of nuclear fusion. The sun loses about one million tons per second due to the solar wind.

The earth's magnetic field keeps the particle shower away from the earth for the most part, only during a strong solar wind can the particles penetrate into the high layers of the atmosphere and cause polar lights there. Strong solar winds also have an influence on the propagation of electromagnetic waves and can interfere with short-wave radio and communication with satellites, among other things.

A clearly visible sign of the existence of the solar wind is provided by comets. Comet tails always point away from the sun, because the gas and dust particles are carried away by the solar wind.

The solar wind reaches far beyond the outer planetary orbits. It drives the interstellar gas out of the solar system and forms a kind of bubble in space called the Heliosphere.

The boundary of the Heliosphere is called the Heliopause. It is also the boundary of the solar system. The exact distance is not known, but observations of the space probe Voyager 2 give reason to believe that the Heliopause is approximately four times as far away as Pluto.

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