Magnetic braking (astronomy)

The magnetic field lines rotate together with the Sun as a solid object. Ionized material carried along the field lines will at some point escape the magnetic field lines and thus take away the Sun's angular momentum.

Magnetic braking is a theory explaining the loss of stellar angular momentum due to material getting captured by the stellar magnetic field and thrown out at great distance from the surface of the star. It plays an important role in the evolution of binary star systems.


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