Earth's magnetic field

Earth's magnetic field (and the surface magnetic field) is approximately a magnetic dipole, with one pole near the geographic north pole and the other near the geographic south pole. An imaginary line joining the magnetic poles would be inclined by approximately 11.3° from the planet's axis of rotation. The cause of the field is probably explained by dynamo theory. The magnetic field extends several tens of thousands of kilometres into space as the magnetosphere.

See also

Field characteristics and phenonomena

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• Ionosphere : Part of the atmosphere that is ionized by solar radiation.
• Schumann resonance : Set of spectrum peaks in the ELF portion of the Earth's electromagnetic field spectrum.
• Solar variation : Fluctuations in the amount of energy emitted by the Sun. Small variations have been measured from satellites during recent decades.
• South Atlantic Magnetic Anomaly : The region where Earth's inner van Allen radiation belt makes its closest approach to the planet's surface.

Disciplines

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• Geophysics : Study of the earth by quantitative physical methods, especially by seismic reflection and refraction, gravity, magnetic, electrical, electromagnetic, and radioactivity methods.
• Magnetohydrodynamics : Academic discipline which studies the dynamics of electrically conducting fluids.

Theories

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• Dynamo theory : Mechanism by which a celestial body such as the Earth generates a magnetic field.

People

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• Edward Sabine : Extensively researched the Earth's magnetic field.