Eugene Norman Parker

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Eugene Norman Parker

1927-

American astronomer who first identified the solar wind. Made of hydrogen, helium, and other particles emitted by the Sun, the solar wind causes the tails of comets to point away from the Sun and constitutes a source of charged particles found in the Van Allen radiation belts surrounding Earth. Since Parker's discovery, stellar winds have been found to play a very important role in stellar evolution and the chemical evolution of galaxies.

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