I recently swapped emails with Dr Brian Thomas from Washburn University, Kansas. He and colleagues have investigated the effects that Richard Carrington’s solar flare of 1859 would have had on the Earth’s atmosphere. Their results are fascinating and just a little scary. You can read an interview that I conducted with Dr Thomas especially for this web site here.

Dr Thomas’s work generated interest in the press as well.  Here are the resultant stories from New Scientist Space and The Discovery Channel on-line.

You can also download the original research paper here.