Slowing of the solar wind in the outer solar system
An article published in “The Astrophysical Journal” reports a study on changes in the solar wind in the outer region of the heliosphere, the bubble in which the influence of the Sun is felt. A team of researchers from the Southwest Research Institute led by Dr. Heather Elliott used measurements collected by NASA’s New Horizons space probe’s Solar Wind Around Pluto (SWAP) instrument to compare the speed of the solar wind at distances from the Sun between 1 and 3 times that of the Earth from the Sun and at distances between 21 and 43 times that distance reveals a slowdown between 5% and 7% at distances between 30 and 43 times that of the Earth from the Sun.
