At 100 molecules per cubic centimeter, this layer of gases is nearly ... a sweeping magnetospheric shield. The magnetosphere isn't part of the atmosphere, since it's not composed of matter.

Qi Zhang, a doctoral student at the Swedish Institute of Space Physics and Umeå University, explores in her doctoral thesis ...

which then take up to three days to collide with the Earth’s atmosphere. This causes a geomagnetic storm, a major disturbance in the magnetosphere which intensifies the aurora. In March 1989 ...

which is a layer of charged particles that, once they reach the upper atmosphere of Earth from space, interacts with its magnetic field. When this complex structure encountered Earth’s magnetosphere, ...