Smartphones can seemingly do everything these days — calling and texting, streaming movies and live TV, not to mention the photography that today’s smartphones can produce — but what if we told you that you have the power to sense the weather in space from the device in your pocket? According to some NASA research, your smartphone may be able to detect space weather, more specifically, you may be able to know firsthand when there’s a geomagnetic storm brewing. 

The Science in Your Smartphone

If you need a refresher on just what these storms are, head to this previous blog post where we wrote all about them!  Sten Odenwald of NASA’s Space Science Education Consortium at Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland has been testing the concept that geomagnetic storms affect the magnetic sensors in our cell phones. His research proposes that any apps that use cell phone magnetometers in order to pinpoint specific locations, could be vulnerable to errors caused by space weather. Not to mention, the sheer amount of phones simultaneously sensing changes in Earth’s magnetic field could help scientists better understand these geomagnetic storms on a basic level. The problem with the GPS systems that are currently being used in our smartphones is that they rely on satellite signals to triangulate a location. This means that in places where signals can’t reach, or, during geomagnetic storms, they are often inaccurate or simply not available.  Geomagnetic storms can distress and temporarily change the shape of Earth’s magnetic field, which means that in theory, they could possibly compromise the accuracy of magnetometer chips. According to EOS, this breakdown could prove to be a problem if someone’s target advertising hits in the wrong place or they miss the mark while performing needle-guided surgery. If we were better able to predict when these storms are happening, though, we could be better prepared.

The Research Process 

In simulated geomagnetic storms, Odenwald tested the iPhone 6S, Samsung Galaxy Note 5, Samsung Galaxy S8, and Samsung Galaxy S9 to see whether phones are vulnerable to fluctuations in space weather. He used magnetic data from the geomagnetic solar storms that occurred on Halloween of 2003 — if you haven’t already, read about that here! — to run simulations on the phones to see whether their magnetic signals would surpass the level of background noise. In addition, he simulated the storms more directly by placing the phones into controlled magnetic fields. After this research, Odenwald discovered that magnetometers in smartphones are capable of detecting even very small changes in the magnetic field that correspond with the strongest geomagnetic storms. More specifically, this is potent at higher latitudes in North America where magnetic field lines intersect and plunge towards Earth as they get closer to the magnetic north pole. He concluded that geomagnetic storms could be a significant source of error in compass and other positioning apps under certain circumstances. Odenwald noted that the ubiquity of smartphones and their magnetometers provides an opportunity for more research to study alterations in the geomagnetic field, with the hope that we can curb some of the effects or find possible replacements when these storms occur. 

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