ABSTRACT
Electric and magnetic fields are associated with planets, stars, pulsars, and exotic objects such as neutron stars. Observations of electromagnetic fields in space normally rely on indirect means, but in our solar system the fields have been directly measured by instruments carried on spacecraft. The behavior of electromagnetic fields is governed by Maxwell’s equations. However, to understand how these fields are produced and what mechanisms transport these fields into other regions of space, knowledge is required of the behavior of charged particles (Chapter 4), the collective properties of charged particles (Chapter 5), and the concept of currents in plasma media (Chapter 7). We must therefore defer to these later chapters a comprehensive discussion of electromagnetic fields in space plasmas.
