IBEX Satellite finds ribbon-like structure at edge of heliosphere

Science paper to describe unexpected structural features shown by LANL camera. The invisible structures of space are becoming less so, as scientists look out to the far edges of the solar wind bubble that separates our solar system from the interstellar cloud through which it flies. Using the High Energy Neutral Atom Imager, led by Los Alamos National Laboratory, the NASA Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) mission has sent back data that indicates a "noodle soup" of solar material has accumulated at the outer fringes of the heliosphere bubble. As the solar wind streams out far beyond Pluto, racing a million miles per hour, it reaches the edge of our bubble and collides with the material between the stars, the interstellar medium. A shock wave forms at that intersection point. The Los Alamos camera is designed to detect the particles that are heated and stream away from that boundary, specifically the density and temperature of atoms that form the core of that layer. The High Energy Neutral Atom Imager instrument is particularly important because its design parameters are well matched to the temperature of most of the soup; about a million degrees centigrade (1.8 million degrees Fahrenheit).