A spacecraft flew through a ripple in the sun's magnetism — and read its birth certificate

ESA's Solar Orbiter flew through an S-shaped kink ('switchback') in the solar wind's magnetic field and traced it back to the sun's surface via telltale charged oxygen and carbon particle fingerprints — the 'smoking gun' for a formation process called interchange reconnection. The paper in Nature Astronomy, led by Jesse Coburn of CNRS/LPP with co-author Stephanie Yardley of Northumbria University, reconciles two competing theories and helps scientists prepare for solar storms that threaten satellites and infrastructure.