Auroral radio signal offers new insight into intense magnetic storms

Watch for Auroral Beads before the Northern Lights: They evolve into the storm

The aurorae are almost always preceded by auroral beads, but what are these clues in the night sky and why do they occur?Auroral beads appear just before an aurora. Image: Adobe.The aurora borealis and aurora australis are almost always preceded by auroral beads, a necklace-like wave of several luminous points of light that will eventually evolve into the storm. But what triggers these is unknown; a new study led by the University of Southampton…

Auroral radio signal offers new insight into intense magnetic storms

Southampton, UK (SPX) Dec 03, 2025 A University of Southampton team has identified a distinct low frequency radio signature that appears when small-scale auroral structures known as auroral beads emerge, providing a new clue to how intense auroral substorms are triggered. Magnetospheric substorms are bursts of activity in Earth's aurora that can rapidly transform faint arcs into bright, dynamic displays stretching across th