Alfvén, H., On the theory of comet tails., Tellus, 9, 92 (1957) (ADS)
(click on the image for a larger version)
It is sometimes hard to identify the very first person who has had a
particular good idea, and here is an obvious case in point.
The cartoon of Hannes Alfvén
presented here antedates the paper
introducing what is now called the "Parker Spiral."
Alfvén's paper clearly was chronologically earlier (submitted
June 22, 1956), and introduced the critical idea of the magnetized solar wind
with its characteristic Archimedean ("Parker") spiral, the first-order result
of a steady radial flow at constant speed.
From this perspective of science history, it seems to the Archivist that
the phenomenon should therefore be called the "Alfvén Spiral" if
indeed anybody's name needs to be attached to it.
Apparently this was a revolutionary concept in either 1956 or 1958, and both
Alfvén and Parker probably need to be congratulated for an innovation here.
The idea of a continuous plasma flow possibly originated with
Birkeland;
note that this cartoon's appeal to a "beam" probably did not imply
a spatially localized stream as much as a velocity-space property.
Note also that Alfvén's contribution followed that of
Ludwig Biermann, who had
already remarked on the implications of the behavior of comet tails and introduced the
term "solar corpuscular radiation" - a kind of supplemental mechanical
luminosity, known in stellar physics as "mass loss".
It is sometimes hard to identify the very first person who has had a particular good idea, and here is an obvious case in point. The cartoon of Hannes Alfvén presented here antedates the paper introducing what is now called the "Parker Spiral." Alfvén's paper clearly was chronologically earlier (submitted June 22, 1956), and introduced the critical idea of the magnetized solar wind with its characteristic Archimedean ("Parker") spiral, the first-order result of a steady radial flow at constant speed. From this perspective of science history, it seems to the Archivist that the phenomenon should therefore be called the "Alfvén Spiral" if indeed anybody's name needs to be attached to it. Apparently this was a revolutionary concept in either 1956 or 1958, and both Alfvén and Parker probably need to be congratulated for an innovation here. The idea of a continuous plasma flow possibly originated with Birkeland; note that this cartoon's appeal to a "beam" probably did not imply a spatially localized stream as much as a velocity-space property. Note also that Alfvén's contribution followed that of Ludwig Biermann, who had already remarked on the implications of the behavior of comet tails and introduced the term "solar corpuscular radiation" - a kind of supplemental mechanical luminosity, known in stellar physics as "mass loss".