UV STUDIES AND THE SOLAR-WIND

The solar wind carves a cavity in the flow of interstellar H atoms thr ough the solar system by charge-exchange ionization. The resulting Ly- alpha sky pattern depends on the latitude distribution of the solar wi nd flux and velocity. We review how the solar wind characteristics (ma ss flux latitude distribution) can be retrieved from Ly-alpha observat ions, yielding a new remote sensing method of solar wind studies, thro ugh UV optical measurements.