Interplanetary medium

The tenuous plasma, magnetic fields, dust, and neutral particles between planets, shaped chiefly by material and energy flowing from the Sun.

Solar wind: A continuous flow of charged particles released from the Sun’s outer atmosphere. It supplies most of the interplanetary medium’s plasma and carries the Sun’s magnetic field outward.
Plasma: An ionized gas containing free electrons and charged ions, whose collective behavior is shaped by electromagnetic forces. Most of the medium’s gas is plasma rather than electrically neutral matter.
Solar corona: The Sun’s extended outer atmosphere, consisting of extremely hot, tenuous plasma. The corona continuously supplies particles that escape as the solar wind.
Space weather: Changing solar and planetary conditions in space that affect technology and human activity. Disturbances in the medium can disrupt satellites, communications, and power systems.
Heliopause: The boundary where the solar wind is stopped by the pressure of the surrounding interstellar medium. It marks the outer limit of the region directly filled by the Sun’s outward-flowing plasma.
Interplanetary magnetic field: The component of the Sun’s magnetic field carried outward by the solar wind. Its changing direction and strength govern how charged particles move through interplanetary space.
Cosmic dust: Small solid particles found between stars and within planetary systems. Dust grains contribute scattered sunlight, zodiacal light, and impact hazards between planets.
Coronal mass ejection: A large eruption of magnetized plasma from the Sun’s corona into interplanetary space. These eruptions inject dense, fast-moving structures into the ambient medium.
Interplanetary scintillation: Rapid variation in radio signals caused by small-scale density irregularities in solar-wind plasma. Radio observations use this effect to map structures moving through the medium.
Termination shock: A boundary where the supersonic solar wind slows abruptly to subsonic speed. It is an internal transition in the solar-wind medium, well inside the heliopause.

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Outer spaceBroader topic: It describes the material environment between planets in the Solar System.