Physics of auroral phenomena : proceedings of the 33rd Annual seminar, Apatity, 02 - 05 March, 2010 / [ed.: A.G. Yahnin, A. A. Mochalov]. - Апатиты : Издательство Кольского научного центра РАН, 2011. - 206 с. : ил.

EFFECTS OF THE LONG-TERM VARIATIONS OF THE SOLAR WIND ON THENEAR-EARTH SPACE variations close to 40 years. Maximal extreme of such variations could be seen in 80-90 years of the last century while its lowest values are seen in 1968-1972 and in 2005-2007 [1]. Too short period o f the reliable satellite measurements of the solar wind parameters makes this statement a bit dubious but some correspondent variations in the climatic characteristics indirectly confirm this suggestion. There are some evidences that the solar wind energy could effectively influence some processes in the Earth’s middle atmosphere at the high latitudes where impact of the solar UV radiation is not too strong [2, 3, 4]. Observed connections of temporal variations of the temperature of the middle atmosphere with parameters of the solar wind can be explained in the framework of the global electrical circuit driven by energy of the solar wind. It was discovered that the temperature o f the stratosphere increases during disturbances of the solar wind if the conductivity of the Earth’s surface is high. Vice versa-the temperature of the stratosphere above places covered by ice has a negative correlation with energy of the solar wind. The stratospheric layer with increased concentration of ions created by galactic or solar charged particles is an important element of the global electric circuit in the polar region for understanding o f this mechanism. Long -term variations of the different kind of the solar activity can influence on electromagnetic energy and fluxes o f galactic or solar charged particles which enter the near - Earth Space and change the Earth climate and weather. Declining phase of the cycle 23 was characterized by extremely low energy of the solar wind. During this period parameters of the solar wind (its density and velocity as well as value of full vector of its magnetic field) had the lowest values for the several last decades. It is worth to note that this period of unusually low energy of the solar wind coincided with significant decrease of the sea ice cover in the Arctic. Figure 2 demonstrates long - term variations o f the solar wind density (left panel) and sea ice cover area in the East-Siberian Sea (right panel) for period 1970 - 2010. Figure 2. Long - term variations of the solar wind density in cm -3 (left panel) and sea ice cover area in the East- Siberian sea in km 2 x 10 3 (right panel) for period 1970 - 2010. One can see a notable similarity between variations of the two data sets: the smaller sea ice cover area corresponds to the lowest values of the solar wind density. The correlation coefficient between these two parameters is comparatively high - 0.71. Of course a possible influence of the solar UV radiation on the ice formation is also significant and due to it the abovementioned correlation coefficient does not exceed a value of 0.71. Nevertheless the relation between the solar wind energy and the sea ice cover area is evident. For a time being only tentative physical explanation o f the found relation could be proposed. So far the solar wind energy contribution to energetic balance of the Earth atmosphere was ignored in any atmospheric and climatic research. Traditionally this energy was attributed entirely to sustain a definite level of geomagnetic activity expressed as intensity o f the geomagnetic substorms and storms but no with parameters of solar wind especially with his density. The solar wind energy determines values of electric field of global electrical circuit including his value on the ground surface. A role of the electric fields intensity on the sea ice formation has not been studied properly. Nevertheless it was found that the electric field in its influence on the water changes a structure o f the water [5]. Most probably this process could accelerate probability of appearance of the nuclei of the ice formation. In this case the enhanced intensity of electric field promotes formations of the ice nuclei and vice versa decreased solar wind density will correspond to lesser sea ice cover area. Figure 3 demonstrates this relation clearly. Here periodicity of the sea ice cover area in the Laptev Sea in the Eastern part of the Arctic Ocean is shown for period 1924-2003. The thick black curve of the Figure 3 represents approximation by the polynome of the third degree variations o f the sea ice cover area in the Laptev Sea. 81