This happens in the form of a CME, in which vast quantities of ionised plasma and electromagnetic radiation, bundled up in a helical magnetic field, are launched into space on the solar wind.

Eighteen days later, that same CME arrived at Ulysses, a spacecraft that, at the time, was at a distance of 5.4 astronomical units, more or less equivalent to the average orbital distance of Jupiter.

They found that, in the 4.4 astronomical units between the two spacecraft, the helical structure of the magnetic cloud eroded significantly.

This could explain why the helical structure of the magnetic cloud in the CME became more twisted by the time it reached 5.4 astronomical units - rather than less, as might be expected.

"What clearly emerges from this analysis is that at 5.4 astronomical units the second magnetic cloud is heavily interacting with the first one," the researchers wrote in their paper.

"As a result, the magnetic structure of the preceding magnetic cloud is strongly deformed.