If all goes according to plan, NASA will launch four Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) spacecraft from Kennedy Space Center in Florida tonight. This is NASA’s first mission to study the phenomenon of magnetic reconstruction.

In the simplest terms magnetic reconnection is just what it sounds like. It happens when a magnetic field is rearranged. When the previous magnetic connection breaks, magnetic energy is covered into thermal and kinetic energy and particle acceleration.

When this happens it can trigger violent space weather, solar storms, coronal mass ejection and other events, many of which can cause problems on Earth.

“Magnetic reconnection is one of the most important drivers of space weather events. Eruptive solar flares, coronal mass ejections, and geomagnetic storms all involve the release, through reconnection, of energy stored in magnetic fields. Space weather events can affect modern technological systems such as communications networks, GPS navigation, and electrical power grids,” said Jeff Newmark, interim director of the Heliophysics Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington in a statement.

The problem with looking at magnetic reconnection in the simplest terms is that there is nothing simple about it. The phenomenon violates a law of physics called Alfvén’s theorem which states that “in a fluid with infinite electric conductivity, magnetic field lines are frozen into the fluid and have to move along with it.”

Despite this, scientists know that it does happen, in fact it occurs through the known universe. What they don’t know is why it happens or what causes it and that is what NASA’s MMS mission is meant to investigate.

Assuming that everything goes according to plan, the MMS spacecraft will begin operations this September. Unlike previous attempts to explore the phenomenon, the new satellites will have sensitive enough equipment to detect the events as they occur.

The mission will use four identical satellite observatories functioning simultaneously to create three-dimensional views of reconnection.

“MMS engineers have completed final observatory closeout procedures and checks and are awaiting transport to the launch pad tomorrow for integration with the Atlas rocket. The team is in high spirits and ready to get these technological marvels in space,” said Craig Tooley, MMS project manager at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.

The four spacecraft will fly together, in tight formation, through reconnection regions taking sensor readings at a rate faster than any previous space mission. Readings will be taken in Earth’s protective magnetic field, called the magnetosphere but its findings will provide information on reconnection events in the atmosphere of the sun, as well as other stars, black holes, neutron stars and other objects.

“This is the perfect time for this mission. MMS is a crucial next step in advancing the science of magnetic reconnection. Studying magnetic reconnection near Earth will unlock the ability to understand how this process works throughout the entire universe,” said Jim Burch, principal investigator of the MMS instrument suite science team at Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) in San Antonio, Texas.

Earlier this month, NASA launched the DSCOVR satellite to track and monitor space weather. While the incredibly advanced instrument will tell us more than ever about events on the sun that could have an impact, the MMS mission will help explain why those events occur. Understanding the process behind these phenomenon will help researchers to predict them, as well as provide a better understanding of other things going on in the cosmos.