The Sun is currently releasing a stream of electrically charged particles. This is the solar wind. Just how this flow can reach incredible velocities was a mystery that endured for decades. It took two spacecraft and international cooperation to get an answer: The magnetic field near the Sun sometimes gets kinky. The “fast” solar wind moves at about 500 kilometers (310 miles) per second. But that’s not the speed at which it escapes the Sun’s corona – the extremely hot atmosphere of our star. The wind, like the corona, has a temperature of millions of degrees and it is expected to cool down as …