Amaia Montero sings “There are more questions than answers in the Northern Lights.” This is the new song from La Oreja by Van Gogh, again (17 years later) with its original singer. In the last hours of 2025, the group from San Sebastian presented their new single, where big philosophical questions arise.
“I believe in God, in my own way / There are more questions than answers / In the northern lights,” Amaia sings. But science only believes in mathematics. An astronomer would tell the singer of Irun that the northern lights are neither a question nor an answer; It’s a fact.
How and why the Northern Lights
Let’s go down to Earth to explain it. Our blue planet is surrounded by its atmospherecomposed of 21% oxygen and protected by what is called magnetic field. Both act as a shield and prevent solar wind blasts.
Yes, there is a wind that comes from the Sun and hits everything what exists in the solar system and beyond. This is radiation composed primarily of protons, but also contains electrons and other components. This wind also reaches our planet.
The Earth’s magnetic field channels this mixture of electrons and protons which collide with the atoms and molecules of gases in the upper layers of the atmosphere (thermosphere and exosphere). These collisions cause the electrons of the nitrogen and oxygen atoms to temporarily rise to a higher energy state“excited”, as the State Meteorological Agency (Aemet) explains.
Why these colors?
As normal energy levels are restored, energy is released and emitted as photons of light with different wavelengths. “These particles then collide with atoms and molecules in the Earth’s atmosphere and heat them,” explains astronomer Tom Kerss of the Royal Museums Greenwich. “It’s very similar to heating a gas and making it glow,” he says.
However, sometimes the Electrically charged particles pierce our planet’s shield. The cause is disturbances such as solar flares or storms on the surface of the Sun. And their consequence, when they occasionally cross our shield, are the Northern Lights.
Its varied colors also have an explanation. The fact that we see different shades depends on the atmosphere. Nitrogen emits a light purple, blue or pink color, while oxygen, when heated, causes green and even scarlet red at very high altitudes.
When we sometimes see them far from the poles
The Northern Lights are typical of the poles (in the south they are the Southern Lights). They are mainly observed in arcs close to the magnetic poles (the auroral ovals), but they are not exclusive. we can see further, that is to say closer, when strong solar storms occur.
“The solar wind is strongest at times close to maximum solar activity, which This happens in cycles of 10 to 12 years“, explains Aemet. In these cases, coronal mass ejections or atmospheric solar flares can intensify the solar wind and reach the Earth’s magnetosphere, triggering a geomagnetic storm.
During these phenomena, the auroral oval temporarily widens, which allows you to perceive the auroras from lower latitudes. This is what happened, for example, in June 2024 in northern Europe and even in Spain in May of the same year, when a geomagnetic storm released large amounts of energy on Earth.
But Amaia is (a little) right
But even though we know a lot about how and why the northern lights occur, there are still some unanswered questions. Astronomers want understand why some auroras have rapid, rhythmic pulsationswhile others exhibit slower, irregular blinking.
These variations could be linked to different types of electromagnetic waves in the Earth’s magnetosphere. To find the answer, A year ago, NASA launched two sounding rockets from Alaska. This is the mission From Ground Imaging to Rocket Investigation of Auroral Fast Features (GIRAFFE).
Understanding the electromagnetic processes of the Northern Lights is also important to protect Earth’s technological infrastructure. Electrical currents generated during geomagnetic storms can damage critical infrastructure on Earth’s surface, such as gas pipelines, undersea cables and power grids.
Auroras on other planets
It’s a feast for the eyes, a moving spectacle… courtesy of the laws of physics. They look beautiful to us on the ground, but they must be even more beautiful from, for example, the International Space Station. Its astronauts were able to enjoy this beautiful dance of colors and even travel through it:
If Van Gogh’s Ear had been a successful band on Mars or Saturn, they could also have released this single and they could also have played with the idea that the Northern Lights hide secrets. Because This phenomenon is not exclusive to Earth; It can be seen on any planet with an atmosphere and a magnetic field.
For example, the red planet. “A A diffuse green glow seems entirely possible in the Mars skyat least when the sun releases energetic particles,” Nick Schneider of the University of Colorado told NASA.
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