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I have always been captivated by the cosmos. I chose CelestialWinds as the name of this profile because I believe that it conveys an image of an aesthetic that I have struggled to satisfactorily describe in words. With its colors dancing between pale turquoise and vibrant aquamarine to an ethereal pinky white, the boundless wonders of the cosmos have unceasingly set my mind ablaze.
The word cosmos derives its origin from the Greek kosmos, meaning “order,” “harmony,” and “the world.” Who hasn't felt a sense of awe while gazing deep into the sky, resplendent with countless stars on a clear night? Who hasn't asked themselves if ours is the only planet that supports life? Who hasn't pondered the nature of the planets, stars, galaxies, and the universe itself? Yes, it is true that humanity's interest in the heavens has been universal and enduring. Humans are driven to explore the unknown, discover new worlds, push the boundaries of our scientific and technical limits, and then push further. Humans seem to have an innate desire to explore the intangible, frequently challenging the boundaries of our knowledge.

I have perpetually been fascinated by the reality that there are winds in space. Space is an almost perfect vacuum full of cosmic voids and nothingness. The phenomenon that powerful winds exist in space, in a vacuum of emptiness, is an inquisitive thing.

There are several different types of celestial winds, most notably solar wind, and galactic wind.

Galactic Winds
Galactic winds are streams of high-speed charged particles often observed blowing out of galaxies. With speeds of between 300 and 3,000 km/sec, these winds can either blow material out into the halo of the galaxy, possibly to mix with the hot X-ray emitting halo gas, or expel the matter from the galaxy completely to mix with the intergalactic medium. Galactic winds have two sources of energy: starbursts and active galactic nuclei (i.e. the supermassive black holes lurking in the centers of most galaxies).

In the case of starbursts, galactic winds are powered by high-speed stellar winds ejected from newly formed massive stars (similar to the solar wind, only far more dense and energetic) and supernova explosions. Galactic winds are believed to play several important roles in the evolution of galaxies. They are responsible for redistributing metals throughout the galaxy and also regulate star formation. If the galactic wind has blown all of the gas out of the galaxy, star formation will cease.

Solar Winds
As with all stars, the Sun loses material by way of a stellar wind. Stellar winds are fast-moving flows of material (protons, electrons, and atoms of heavier metals) that are ejected from stars. These winds are characterized by a continuous outflow of material moving at speeds anywhere between 20 and 2,000 km/sec. In the case of the Sun, the wind “blows” at a speed of 200 to 300 km/sec from quiet regions, and 700 km/sec from coronal holes and active regions.

The solar wind causes many phenomena when it interacts with the Earth’s upper atmosphere and magnetic field, the most visible of which are the aurorae (Borealis and Australis). These are produced when solar wind particles accelerated by the Earth’s magnetic field collide with atoms and molecules in the upper atmosphere. As the atoms and molecules de-excite, they emit light at specific wavelengths.

Solar winds play an important part in the chemical evolution of the Universe, as they carry dust and metals back into the interstellar medium where they will be incorporated into the next generation of stars.