Project Aether Sends Cameras 100,000 Feet To Photograph Northern Lights (VIDEO) (UPDATE)

UPDATE: 4:00 p.m. 4/26 -- An earlier version of this story quoted "Plasma Jam's" description on Vimeo, which has since been changed, that said it "contains the first-ever photos from within the Northern Lights." The Huffington Post spoke to Ben Longmier, the founder and director of Project Aether, who elaborated in an email to The Huffington Post why that statement isn't accurate.

The balloons did not go inside the aurora. The light emission from the aurora typically occurs at altitudes from ~80-200km, where the exact altitude range depends on the energy of incoming electrons and ions streaming from the Sun. However, secondary ionization that is caused by the aurora exists at much lower altitudes, and the balloons and cameras did fly directly through these areas of enhanced ionization. Early indications from our new plasma instrument show this enhanced ionization as a function of altitude up to the balloon burst height of 31km. In order for our sensors to pick up these signals they had to measure electrical currents as low as 1/100th of a nano-Amp.

Additionally, based on the National Geographic report, an earlier version of this post said that Ad Astra Rocket Company collaborated with Project Aether: Aurora. Longmier works at Ad Astra but the company is not involved with the Project Aether: Aurora expedition.

PREVIOUSLY:

We've all seen some awe-inspiring videos of the northern lights but, with the exception of those taken from airplanes and the International Space Station, all of them have been shot from terra firma.

Until now.

According to National Geographic, GoPro, the company behind those tiny HD video cameras, teamed up with Texas A&M University to send weather balloons into the aurora borealis in central Alaska. The balloons were equipped not only with instruments to study the aurora, but also with modified GoPro cameras.

The effort was the latest project from a group called "Project Aether," which aims to work with schools to teach students about physics, research "and to make space exploration accessible to students," according to the organization's web site.

One of the products of the launch was "Plasma Jam," a short video that alternates between photos taken on the ground and images snapped at 100,000 feet. A GoPro camera is visible in the images that were taken at high altitude.

An aurora is caused by the collision of electrons from space with atoms and molecules of gases (like oxygen and nitrogen) in the Earth's atmosphere, according to the Geophysical Institute at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. This collision results in a transfer of energy to the oxygen's electrons, and, as a result, quick bursts of light are emitted. A great number of these collisions create the light that's visible to the naked eye.

Click over to National Geographic to read more about Project Aether and see pictures of the weather balloons.

Comments

[pov123]

09:25 AM on 04/29/2012

This is from the video source... to address the non-believers. (No, the world is not flat.) Something the editors here apparently haven't come to terms with, either.

This timelapse video contains the first-ever photos from alongside the edge of the Northern Lights, aka. the Aurora Borealis.

Captured at 100,000 feet using a modified GoPro HD Hero2 camera attached to a carbon fiber frame, this homemade spacecraft reached altitude using a helium weather balloon and also hosted other scientific instruments used to measure features of the Aurora.

[Note: there has been some questions as to why GoPro staged another camera in the frame during the flight, and it's not as an advertisement as some have suggested. It's because the camera needs to have an item to focus on, rather than the opposite effect when the camera focuses on infinity and everything is blurred out beyond recognition.]

According to the project leader, Ben Longmier, "We were measuring the plasma particle density at an altitude of 30 km, where the particle density is enhanced due to the presence of the aurora and high energy electrons streaming down into the magnetosphere."

[wallinmark]

09:04 PM on 04/27/2012

It is an amazing world we have here ,to bad we cannot all get along and see it as a child enjoys new things ,with child like eyes.

[Canefighter]

05:19 PM on 04/26/2012

I do not really care where the pictures where actually taken. They are real cool, the wonders of nature never cease to amaze me.

[Zouberi6]

12:54 PM on 04/26/2012

Even as a child i always wanted to see the aurora. Although it still looks the same from the ground, at least there showing some interest in it

[Opus Fideo]

12:01 PM on 04/26/2012

looks the same as from the ground.

[Carl Caroli]

11:23 AM on 04/26/2012

Very cool.

[palindrom]

09:11 AM on 04/26/2012

The lower edge of the aurora is typically at 100 km altitude, which is three times higher than this balloon was flying. It can't get much lower because the emission can only occur at very low densities, and the density of air increases below 100 km.

So the claim that the pictures were taken from within the aurora is false. Only rockets and satellites can get inside an aurora -- balloons can't go high enough.

The University of Alaska Geophysical Institute has an excellent site about aurorae:

http://odin.gi.alaska.edu/FAQ/

[Opus Fideo]

12:01 PM on 04/26/2012

thank you. i was thinking the same thing.

[wallinmark]

09:08 PM on 04/27/2012

Thank you ,I recieved email pictures of aurora above teepees lit up inside the teepee. wonderfull to camp out in the snow watching the sight of auroras.