IÇIÔ. No. I. ARE THE SOLAR CORPUSCLE RAYS NEGATIVE OR POSITIVE? 



lated that the negative electric tension necessary to send out such ray 

 was about 600 million volts. 



After this it seems as if we have to admit that the sun under different 

 circumstances by electric eruptions, frequently of very short duration, can 

 send out rays that reach the earth, rays that have Ho between one 

 million and a hundred millions. 



Calculation of the Energy Conveyed by the Corpuscular Precipitation 

 during a Great Magnetic Storm. 



6. We will now calculate a lower limit for the kinetic energy of a 

 ray-precipitation in the auroral zone causing a strong polar magnetic 

 storm. As we shall see, it is possible to do this with satisfactory approxi- 

 mation on account of the researches made in 1902 — 1903, and we arrive 

 at the astonishing result that the quantity of corpuscular ray energy present 

 during a great storm is comparable to or even greater than the total 

 insolation of ordinary heat from the sun to the whole earth during the 

 same period of time. In the calculation we recur to the following hypo- 

 thesis by which we obtain only a small lower limit for the kinetic energy 

 of the corpuscular current. We first find the position in space and the 

 intensity of a hypothetical linear galvanic current producing the same mag- 

 netic effects as those observed in the district in which the polar storm is 

 most powerful. Then we assume that the corpuscles of the existing ray- 

 current flow parallel to and not very far from the path of the hypothe- 

 tical galvanic current; and that we obtain in this way a small lower limit 

 for the amount of energ}' of the corpuscular stream is evident from the 

 considerations given in article 36 A. P.<- pp. 99 and 105. 



When our system of corpuscles moves with a common velocity of 

 translation the electromagnetic energy in so far as it depends on the 

 motion can be made up of parts each belonging to one electron so that 

 for small velocities it can be represented b}-: 



On account of the extreme smallness of the electrons this can be 

 assumed to be so in our case, as the electrons are postulated as being 

 so far apart that their fields may be said not to overlap. 



Then if we call the number of corpuscles that pass the cross section 

 in the time-unit «, the apparent mass of a particle /;/, and the velocity :■, 

 we obtain the kinetic energy IV 



IV ^ — H • m ■ V- . 



