Can the Northern Lights be imitated?

Question

Is it humanely possible to create a northern lights effect on a surface, much like the one effect in Balto? I know it can be done digitally, but im talking about actually making one on a hill at night or at least something to that effect

Answer 1

sure. bluga bluga wavy wavy I'm northern lights.....

hows my imitation?

not on a hill. it would have to be an enclosed experiment within a vacuum. I'm not sure how we'd created charged particles, but we'd slam them into a magnetic field which is not hard to create.

sound hypothetically possible. might not be an exact duplicate in any means though......

I'm sure the chemical make up of our atmosphere has something to do with the color as well.

Answer 2

Artificial aurorae have been created by releasing special compounds at very high altitude (from satellites). This was done to study the Earth's magnetic field.

I think they used barium compounds. 1985? German satellite (ion release module)?

It has to be done at the same altitude because the Northern light work on the same principle as fluorescent tubes: charged particles go through very low density gas and ionizes the gas molecules (and atoms); when the ionized molecule recaptures an electron (and becomes neutral again), it emits light.

In Aurora, the charged particles come from space (mostly the Solar wind) and the low density gas is Nitrogen and Oxygen at very high altitude.

In a fluorescent tube, the charged particles are electrons (from the electricity) and the low density gas used depends on the colour you want to achieve (e.g., Neon for red)

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A USA test of a Hydrogen bomb (fusion bombs) in July 1962 released electrons in the upper atmosphere, creating an aurora.

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At the altitudes where we can still breathe, the air density is way too high for the phenomena to take place (the charged particles would lose their charge too fast and would fail to ionise enough atoms or molecules to create anything we could see).

Answer 3

I suppose its possible.

You would need a polarized directional magnetic field in the air (that could be tough to do).
Then you would need a stream of ionized particles entering that magnetic field with the right orientation (generally southward for the northern lights) and of the right energy (from 1 - 100 keV).
And you would need the right atmospheric components (the aurora are the result of the ionized particles interacting with atomic oxygen, hydrogen, and molecular and ionic nitrogen).

Answer 4

doubtful, but tell someone no and they will find a way.

good question. you get a star