Energetic neutral atom imaging, often described as "seeing with atoms", is a technology used to create global images of otherwise invisible phenomena in the magnetospheres of planets and at the boundary of the heliosphere - the far flung outer edge of the solar system. ENA images are constructed from the detection of energetic neutral atoms that are created in charge-exchange processes between ions in a hot plasma, such as the solar wind, and the atoms of a cold neutral background gas. Earth's magnetosphere preserves Earth's atmosphere and protects us from cell damaging radiation. This region of "space weather" is the site of geomagnetic storms that disrupt communications systems and pose radiation hazards to humans traveling at high polar altitudes or in orbiting spacecraft. A deeper understanding of this region is vitally important. Geomagnetic weather systems have been late to benefit from the satellite imagery taken for granted in weather forecasting, and space physics because their origins in magnetospheric plasmas present the added problem of invisibility.

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