What Is Nature's Colored Light Show?

The Polar Lights have got to be among the most fascinating sights in the world. These glowing or flickering colored night lights are known in the Northern Hemisphere as the Aurora Borealis, or Northern Lights, and in the Southern Hemisphere as the Aurora Australis, or Southern Lights.

These displays light up the sky with flashing, moving red and green colors. Some form arcs hundreds of miles long; others are long, thin rays.

Scientists think that both Aurorae are caused by electrical discharges of protons and electrons from the sun colliding with other particles in the atmosphere.