Thunderbolts Forum

'12-10-31, 10:59 Maol	Re: Call for Criticisms on New Solar Model CharlesChandler wrote: We know from the ideal gas laws that compressing a gas increases the temperature, and thus the hydrostatic pressure, as a direct function of the decrease in volume. We also know that if we compress the gas all of the way down to the density of a liquid, the matter is incompressible past that point. This is because in liquids, the electron shells of neighboring atoms overlap, and further compression will cause the failure of the shells. Since electrons can only exist as free particles or in specific shells, if the atoms are forced too close together, the electrons are expelled. Then we are left with only positive ions, which are repelled by their like charges. Hence it is the electric force that gives liquids their incompressibility. As we continue the compression, and start to squeeze out electrons, the electric force pushes back. This is not so. Each element and molecule has its unique temperature/pressure critical point, above which there is no distinction between the liquid and gaseous states. When in the supercritical state, fluids are compressible as if they were gaseous.
'12-10-31, 13:08 Sparky	Re: Call for Criticisms on New Solar Model Since I knew nothing about supercritical fluids, I found this: Due to the high compressibility of supercritical fluids, small changes in pressure can produce substantial changes in density which, in turn, affect diffusivity, viscosity, dielectric, and solvation properties of these fluids, thus dramatically influencing the kinetics and mechanisms of chemical reactions. @ https://www.msu.edu/~kalinich/scf.html There must be a point where they can no longer be compressed. Would they be considered "supercritical" at that point?
'12-10-31, 14:13 CharlesChandler	Re: Call for Criticisms on New Solar Model [NB: Please excuse the verbosity of this post. If you're not interested in the properties of supercritical fluids, you can skip this one. ] Maol wrote: When in the supercritical state, fluids are compressible as if they were gaseous. Indeed, if liquids were actually incompressible, in the sense that they absolutely could not be compressed any further, then nuclear fusion would not be possible. And yet we know that it is possible to push atoms beyond the Coulomb barrier and to fuse them into heavier atoms. So yes, liquids are compressible. The point is that it takes a lot more force, and this has to be taken into account. Things get a lot more interesting at high pressures and high temperatures. If the atoms are already ionized due to high temperatures, there isn't a distinct step in the Coulomb barrier when compression causes the failure of electron shells, because the electrons have already been expelled. So the Coulomb force is already there, prematurely if you will, as the simple repulsion of like charges between the atoms, and without being offset by any attraction to shared electrons. So you can compress those atoms right past the "incompressibility" of the liquid, as if it wasn't there, when really, you're already up against the Coulomb force, in addition to the hydrostatic pressure. For hydrogen, having only one proton and one electron, either it's ionized, in which case the electrons are already unbound, and there's no k-shell failure, or the atoms are still neutral, in which case they'll act like an incompressible fluid. For heavier elements, it isn't that simple, as ionization isn't an all-or-nothing issue. For each successive degree of ionization, it takes even more heat. This is because the outer electrons in a heavy element are loosely bound to the atom, while the inner electrons are tightly bound. So the first degree of ionization is easy, while the last is tough. So if you pack atoms closer together than their outer shells would allow, but if the atoms already lost those electrons to thermal ionization, there won't be a distinct step in the Coulomb force at that distance. But the atoms might still have bound electrons in inner shells, and there you'll get the typical behavior, with a new degree of force when the electrons are expelled by pressure. Nevertheless, to think of a supercritical fluid as compressible, as if it was a gas, it technically true, though it lends itself to a conception that the Coulomb force is not there, which is not correct. Rather, you have to put the fluid under such an enormous amount of force, to get to that density while at an extreme temperature, that you might not notice that there is a new form of repulsion in there (i.e., the Coulomb force). But if you try to predict the density-pressure-temperature relationship with the ideal gas laws, you'll be way off. If you actually want to know how a supercritical fluid is going to act, you don't use the ideal gas laws, nor the predictions of quantum mechanics. Rather, you see if you can find a paper where somebody actually tested the properties of that element or mixture, and wrote up the results. The reason why people would even bother doing this is because the theoretical predictions are somewhere between inaccurate and "what were they thinking?" Here we have to remember that quantum mechanics was already taking shape before all of the scientists working on it had bought into the Bohr model of the atom. The abstract and heuristic nature of QM is evidence of the number of uncertainties confronting early 20th century scientists. Unfortunately, no one has ever gone back and worked out a theory that accurately matches lab results for supercritical fluids. Then, when you start talking about what's going on inside a star, things get even more interesting. First, we have no direct knowledge of the temperatures inside a star. Second, the laboratory evidence is extremely sparse, as the conditions have few practical applications here on Earth, and hence there is little incentive for lab work. And then, whenever astronomers find something that they can't understand, they just modify QM to predict those results under those circumstances, and say that they figured it out. For example, white dwarfs would seem to have such a dense gravitational field that they should collapse under their own weight. So scientists invented the concept of "electron degeneracy pressure" to prevent the collapse. This only applies to white dwarfs. In pulsars, scientists couldn't figure out how such a massive object could pulse so rapidly. So they calculated what they thought to be the maximum size for an object that would pulse as an integral unit, and then, to pack all of that mass into such a small space required that they give it the density of the nucleus of an atom. If they were real atoms, the Coulomb force would be much more powerful than gravity. So pulsars can only be made of neutrally charged particles — neutrons. Note that electron degeneracy pressure didn't prevent this collapse, because that only applies to white dwarfs. And neutrons that do not undergo beta decay in the absence of the weak nuclear force only applies to neutron stars. And none of this agrees with nuclear fusion research, which maintains that the Coulomb barrier is real, even at extreme temperatures and pressures (otherwise we'd already have working fusion reactors), and no, it isn't electron degeneracy pressure, because there aren't any electrons in there, and no, neutrons always decay within 15 minutes outside of the nucleus of an atom. This leaves a lot of very fundamental issues open to debate. As we will never have direct knowledge of what is going on inside stars, IMO the only way to proceed is to test hypotheses to see how consistently they can be applied, to how many different data-sets, and without violating any known principles of physics. I acknowledge that the way I handle physical states is a vast oversimplification. But it's the clearest way I've found to present the material, without spending the first 20 pages on philosophical debates in the particle physics community. To make a long story short, there isn't good reason to believe that nuclear fusion is occurring in the core of the Sun. (Rather, it occurs in the stepped leaders of arc discharges near the surface.) Without a source of heat in the center, the internal temperatures are far lower. I actually base my calculations on 6000 K throughout. I have reason to believe that at 125 Mm below the surface it is higher than that, but I don't know how much higher, and it certainly isn't anything like the 15 MK in the standard model. At 6000 K, the hydrogen will be ionized, but the heavier elements (e.g., iron & nickel) will only be partially ionized. So distinct steps in the Coulomb force will still be there. Gravity will act more forcefully on ions than on electrons, due to the difference in mass. This is especially true for heavier elements. This means that gravity will separate charges, even if none of the electrons are bound. Once the charges are partially separated, the electric force will remove degrees of freedom, thus effectively reducing the temperature, and allowing the matter to be more densely packed. This increases the gravitational field, which increases the gravitational charge separation. So it's still a force feedback loop, and gravity is still responsible to concentrating the force in the core. To my knowledge, the only part of the model that really becomes questionable when the fine-grain details of supercritical fluids are taken into account is whether or not there are s-waves at the "liquid line" 125 Mm below the surface. This would actually be a theoretical issue even outside of the context of supercriticality, as a steady increase in pressure, that compacts a gas eventually into a fluid, doesn't produce a distinct increase in density when the incompressibility of the liquid is hit. Rather, the density simply never gets much greater past that point. And without a sharp charge in density, there aren't going to be s-waves. Nevertheless, I think that there's a boundary there, for a variety of reasons. Hydrogen below that level is definitely ionized, while above that level, it doesn't have to be, just taking pressure into account. So charge recombination in hydrogen is possible above 125 Mm, but not below. This means that p-waves at that depth, in the decompression cycle, will cool the plasma, and enable electron uptake. The compression cycle will re-ionize the plasma. So there could be a constant source of arc discharges at this level. The extra heat will create a layer of thin plasma above the "liquid line", and this is what enables s-waves at a distinct difference in density.
'12-10-31, 17:39 Maol	Re: Call for Criticisms on New Solar Model CharlesChandler wrote: [NB: Please excuse the verbosity of this post. If you're not interested in the properties of supercritical fluids, you can skip this one. ] Maol wrote:When in the supercritical state, fluids are compressible as if they were gaseous.To my knowledge, the only part of the model that really becomes questionable when the fine-grain details of supercritical fluids are taken into account is whether or not there are s-waves at the "liquid line" 125 Mm below the surface. This would actually be a theoretical issue even outside of the context of supercriticality, as a steady increase in pressure, that compacts a gas eventually into a fluid, doesn't produce a distinct increase in density when the incompressibility of the liquid is hit. Rather, the density simply never gets much greater past that point. And without a sharp charge in density, there aren't going to be s-waves. Nevertheless, I think that there's a boundary there, for a variety of reasons. Hydrogen below that level is definitely ionized, while above that level, it doesn't have to be, just taking pressure into account. So charge recombination in hydrogen is possible above 125 Mm, but not below. This means that p-waves at that depth, in the decompression cycle, will cool the plasma, and enable electron uptake. The compression cycle will re-ionize the plasma. So there could be a constant source of arc discharges at this level. The extra heat will create a layer of thin plasma above the "liquid line", and this is what enables s-waves at a distinct difference in density. This is the deal. Above the critical point there is no 'liquid line'. There is no demarcation between liquid and vapor. There is only a homogonous fluid. http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/criti ... d_997.html I hope this is not too pedantic. I think you're over-thinking this phenomenon of the supercritical state of matter. It has nothing to do with ionization. Like thawing and boiling, the point at which any given matter enters the supercritical state is merely a function of temperature and therefore pressure. Also, don't mistake liquid state with fluid state. Water is liquid, water vapor gas is fluid. Water is famously solid below 273° K, liquid between 273° and 373°, and vapor above 373° K (at STP). The critical temperature of water is 705°K which corresponds to 3203 PSI. There is no ionization involved, only heat. This is the heat and pressure condition commonly known as "superheated steam" in power plants. Another common example of a supercritical fluid is found in racing Nitrous Oxide systems. Nitrous oxide becomes supercritical at about 98°F and 1050 PSI, much to the chagrin of racers who find it won't flow as much mass per unit of time in their injection systems when in the compressible critical state as it does in the liquid state (in which they tune the systems), so causing engine problems in hot weather. Again, there is no ionization involved, merely exceeding the critical temperature threshold results in this phenomenon, just like thawing and boiling. This is not to say a supercritical fluid could not be ionized, I don't see why not.
'12-10-31, 17:41 Maol	Re: Call for Criticisms on New Solar Model Sparky wrote: Since I knew nothing about supercritical fluids, I found this: Due to the high compressibility of supercritical fluids, small changes in pressure can produce substantial changes in density which, in turn, affect diffusivity, viscosity, dielectric, and solvation properties of these fluids, thus dramatically influencing the kinetics and mechanisms of chemical reactions. @ https://www.msu.edu/~kalinich/scf.html There must be a point where they can no longer be compressed. Would they be considered "supercritical" at that point? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_critical_fluid
'12-10-31, 19:33 Sparky	Re: Call for Criticisms on New Solar Model So hydrogen goes to supercritical at a very low temp., then with more pressure, directly to fusion... Would that be cold fusion?
'12-10-31, 20:38 Maol	Re: Call for Criticisms on New Solar Model Supercritical is just a fourth physical state of matter, solid, liquid, vapor, supercritical. Ionized is a fifth state, however ionization is an electrical phenomenon, where supercritical is a physical state of heat and pressure. For any matter, atomic or molecular, it is the temperature above which no increase in amount of pressure will cause it to be liquid. It is fluid but not liquid. It is the temperature above which there ceases to be a liquid boundary or meniscus, the fluid assumes uniform properties. The heat energy causes the repulsive forces to become greater than the attractive forces. In such repulsive condition there can be no surface tension, therefore no surface.
'12-11-01, 05:07 CharlesChandler	Re: Call for Criticisms on New Solar Model I think we're talking at slightly different levels of description, and it might be useful to identify the difference. Maol wrote: I think you're over-thinking this phenomenon of the supercritical state of matter. It has nothing to do with ionization. Like thawing and boiling, the point at which any given matter enters the supercritical state is merely a function of temperature and therefore pressure. I understand that the phase diagrams for elements, compounds, and mixtures can be drawn strictly on the basis of temperature and pressure. Below the critical point, you get solids, liquids, and gases. Above the critical point, you get this new state. Like a solid, the atoms are in a closest-packed arrangement, and wave transmission speeds and thermal conduction are similar to solids. But there is no crystal lattice, so the matter is fluid. But unlike a liquid, it is compressible, like a gas. So all of the rules have changed, and supercritical fluids are rightfully considered to be a distinct physical state. And you need not measure ionization to make these determinations. Those are all observations. But I want to know why matter has different physical states. In ancient times, people understood that there was a difference between physical states, and this was built into their conception that everything was just different combinations of earth, water, wind, & fire (i.e., solids, liquids, gases, & plasmas). But those aren't essences — they're physical states, and we now have a much more accurate definition of these states. And it all has to do with electrons. In solids, covalent bonding creates a rigid crystal lattice. In liquids, there is too much atomic motion for the lattice, but you still have surface tension from the shared electrons. In gases you have only the molecular bonds left. And in plasmas, there is no bonding at all. So observing the differences between physical states doesn't require atomic theory, but explaining them without acknowledging the significance of charges particles is impossible. To say that physical states have nothing to do with ionization means that you're talking at the level of observation, not explanation. So here's where things get interesting. What is the explanation of the behaviors of supercritical fluids? The reason why I need to know is that we cannot directly observe the interior of the Sun. So we can only start with a thorough understanding of first principles. That might not give us all of the answers. But it will define a finite solution domain, and some of the proposals (such as the "fusion furnace" model) will be found to be outside of the limits of physical possibilities. Once in a physics-constrained environment, we can then test each of the possibilities, to see whether or not they would be capable of generating the observations. Maybe in the end we'll have several possibilities, or maybe we'll be able to narrow it down to just one. But we should definitely eliminate all of the impossibilities! Maol wrote: This is not to say a supercritical fluid could not be ionized, I don't see why not. Newtonian and Maxwellian physics are often treated separately. So you've got your ideal gas laws, and then oh by the way, the matter can also be ionized, but that doesn't affect the ideal gas laws. Ah, but it certainly does! Without making any change to the temperature or pressure, you can shift matter all of the way through the solid-liquid-gas-plasma series, just by sucking electrons out of the mix. Hydrogen at absolute zero would normally be solid, but in a powerful electric field, it can be fully ionized. Now what physical state is it in? (It's plasma.) Furthermore, extreme temperatures cause ionization. So hydrogen at 6000 K isn't maybe ionized or maybe neutral, though too hot to be molecular. That's all plasma! At that temperature, the electron momenta are greater than the electric forces, and the electrons spend most of their time in the unbound state. (Only randomization in the particle velocities enables electron uptake, but the electrons don't stay bound for long.) So a complete treatment of the topic necessitates the identification of the microphysics responsible for the observations. As concerns solids, liquids, & gases, we already have a mechanistic model. For supercritical fluids, the observations exist, but I haven't found a nuts-n-bolts model that matches the lab results. So this is a theoretical endeavor. But it goes without saying that all of the forces have to be taken into account. It isn't just thermal momentum. If it was that simple, you wouldn't need quantum mechanics to issue theoretical predictions of supercritical properties, nor would anybody be scratching their heads, wondering why the lab results don't match the QM predictions. Electric charges produce respectable forces at the atomic level, and I'm betting that the mechanistic model that will emerge somebody will include such forces.
'12-11-01, 09:22 CharlesChandler	Re: Call for Criticisms on New Solar Model Oops, I meant to say, "I'm betting that the mechanistic model that will emerge someday will include such forces."
'12-11-01, 18:42 GaryN	Re: Call for Criticisms on New Solar Model @Charles Please post any additional information you gain A reply from Mr Lovelace at Cornell, but no opinion on CME magnitudes. I have an introduction to one of his former students, a Mr Chen at the NRL, so will contact him. This is Mr Chens PPT presentation on mechanisms, but nothing in there about magnitudes. http://www.pppl.gov/colloquia_pres/WC20 ... _JChen.ppt
'12-11-03, 04:43 CharlesChandler	Re: Call for Criticisms on New Solar Model BTW, before the issue of the behavior of solar supercritical fluids is closed, we should consider one of the other implications of enormous electric fields. (I'll grant you that the fields might not come from "compressive ionization" as I simplistically put it, but rather, from gravity acting more forcefully on nucleons than on electrons. Regardless...) If there is a charge separation mechanism, it removes degrees of freedom, and thus heat. We know this just by the conservation of energy. When charges recombine, they generate heat. Where did they get that heat? It is a conversion of electrostatic potential to thermal kinetics. And what was the effect of the electrostatic potential being created in the first place? It was a conversion of thermal kinetics to electrostatic potential. So the energy is conserved all of the way through. I briefly touched on this in a previous post concerning the energy budget of a dusty plasma that condenses into a star. (Something has to cool the plasma, or the 1020 K just might preclude condensation.) The implication at the atomic level is that the matter might actually be very cool. In fact, the temperature in the core might actually be absolute zero! It would be a mistake to underestimate the amount of "potential heat" (if you will) that it has, and would release if the pressure was relaxed. But if we stuck a thermometer in there, we might get 0 K. This would make sense of an interesting fact: the core is acoustically opaque. We know that it's there, by the helioseismic shadow that it casts on the opposite side of the Sun. But waves going in one side and coming out the other have never been detected. If the core was a compressible supercritical fluid, it would be acoustically transparent. But taking the Coulomb force between ions into account, it might be pressed down into a closest-packed arrangement, in what we might call a liquid crystal configuration (i.e., "crystal" because of the rigidly ordered arrangement of the atoms, but "liquid" because of a lack of covalent bonds). Acoustically, this will act like one solid mass, and only something forceful enough to move the entire mass all at once could get energy coming out the other side. The p-waves bouncing around inside the Sun do not have this force. So they are simply reflected back out. So if the core is frozen rock solid, is it a supercritical fluid? Matter isn't supercritical unless both the temperature and the pressure are above the critical point. What if the pressure is a lot greater, but the temperature is a lot less? Then the atoms are not going to be ionized just by temperature, and you have to re-introduce all of those electrons shells that you didn't have in the supercritical state. Then, at sufficient pressures, the matter will be ionized by the pressure. So compressive ionization comes back into the picture. If anybody can present the physics with a higher degree of confidence, I'd love to hear it. It gives me no comfort to be working through the permutations of different configurations of forces, knowing that a little twitch in the theoretical substrate could cause a devastating earthquake in the framework I'm building. So I have to leave a lot of possibilities open, and the only way that I can proceed is to just keep narrowing the solution domain by looking for mutually constraining data. But the existing models are flatly naive by comparison. For example, the Dalsgaard model simply runs out the ideal gas laws, knowing the overall mass of the Sun, the external temperature, and the "fusion furnace" model core temperature. That produces a steady increase in density, which would be OK for a simple supercritical fluid. But helioseismology detects 3 distinct layers in the Sun: the core, the "radiative" zone, and the "convective" zone. (The last two get their names from the role that they play in the fusion furnace model, but their existence was certified by helioseismology, and never would have been predicted by the principles of nuclear fusion.) So if the Sun is all just supercritical hydrogen, what produces the 3 distinct layers in the Sun? IMO, the only reasonable approach is to take all of the facts into account, and to keep sifting through candidates until we find one that cannot be eliminated by any of the known facts.
'12-11-03, 20:06 Lloyd	Re: Call for Criticisms on New Solar Model Charles, thanks for continuing to explain things. Sandy didn't interfere much, it seems. Have you made any predictions about what might be the maximum density of matter that's possible and what would be able to produce such density? Michael likes to think that neutronium is real and I guess he'd say it's the densest possible form of matter. I can understand how, if a large amount of neutronium were somehow formed, it might take a long time for the surface to "evaporate" into normal matter, but I don't know of any theoretical known combination of real conditions that could produce neutronium. I think Oliver Manuel assumes that supernovae would do the trick, but Thornhill has pointed out that the supernova explosion would have to be very symmetrical in order to condense anything appreciably in the center, and it's highly improbable that such explosions would ever approach the necessary degree of symmetry to succeed. He also says such explosions are electrical double layer explosions, rather than nuclear or other kinds of explosions. Do you agree that supernovae are likely double layer explosions? Do you think the size and density of nebulae would primarily determine the maximum possible density of a star core that forms from a nebula? If so, do you have any clues about what might be the maximum possible size and density of a nebula? Have you stated on your website what the conditions would likely be for formation of your natural tokamak within your collapsing nebula? Do you know what would be about the minimum size and density possible for such a tokamak? Do you have any reason to doubt Arp's and Thornhill's models of galaxy formation from quasars, and quasar formation within galactic nuclei? Since they consider that the nuclei act as plasma guns that shoot out low-mass high-speed highly ionized quasars, which then gain mass and lose velocity and ionization, I assume those conclusions are based on their observations of quasars. So would your tokamak also be able to shoot out plasmoids like that, such as quasars or stars? I just found this site about plasma astronomy, but have only skimmed through it a bit. Looks potentially interesting. http://www.angelfire.com/rnb/pp0/plasma3.html Here are some short quotes: Filament-like super clusters of galaxies (seen in the 'Cosmic Tapestry' map of the universe) are like larger versions of the filaments in the plasma focus and filaments to form galaxies. They would produce magnetic fields in which galaxies, as they rotate, would produce the plasmoids that make up quasars, or active galactic nuclei. - ... Plasma experiments show that some energy will be stored in a donut shaped 'plasmoid' above the Sun's equator. The energy is released sporadically from the plasmoid to the mid-latitudes of the Sun. - ... The first filaments will be the super cluster chains. These give birth to proto clusters which in turn generate galaxies. Finally the galaxies produce stellar clouds which will condense into stars. At each stage the inward flowing currents and background magnetic field will brake the spinning plasma, allowing further contraction of the proto-cluster, proto-galaxy or proto star. - ... A quasar is thus the means by which the excess energy of rotation is carried away in the form of energetic jets [so that the galaxy can collapse].
'12-11-04, 15:04 GaryN	Re: Call for Criticisms on New Solar Model Another 'jet' movie. This one has puzzled the scientists for a while, SS433. I should think the gas-dynamic acceleration model is dead by now, but don't see any newer papers. ACCELERATION, RADIATION, AND PRECESSION IN SS 433 J. I. http://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi- ... lassic=YES
'12-11-04, 17:39 CharlesChandler	Re: Call for Criticisms on New Solar Model Hey Lloyd! As usual, you ask tough, thought-provoking questions. Lloyd wrote: Have you made any predictions about what might be the maximum density of matter that's possible and what would be able to produce such density? Neutronium certainly exists during the nuclear fusion process, and a supernova would seem to be capable of generating it, at least at first. What I don't understand is why a supernova doesn't split as many atoms as it fuses. During the initial phase of the explosion, you'd get a lot of fusion. But once the thing started to expand, I'd think that collisions between relativistic particles would split heavy atoms. In other words, the only difference between fusion and fission is how confined the particles are. If you smash two atoms together, and there is a great surrounding pressure, the pieces can't go anywhere, and if they are still within the range of the strong & weak nuclear forces, all of the pieces will clank back together into an even bigger atom. That's fusion. But without a great surrounding pressure, the pieces all fly apart in different directions. That's fission. So during the expansion phase of a supernova, I don't understand how heavy elements survive. Hence I'm questioning the conventional wisdom that supernovae are a major source of heavier elements. This puts me in agreement with Thornhill, though I'm introducing an objection to the standard model other than a lack of perfect symmetry. It is certainly true that whatever neutronium is produced in a supernova will either get used up in the formation of heavier elements, or it will undergo beta decay with 15 minutes. So there isn't any neutronium floating around in space. But what about inside the cores of heavy stars? Your guess is as good as mine, but here's what I'm thinking. If you instantaneously compress neutrally charged matter, there are plenty of protons and electrons in there, which can be fused into neutrons. But I'm not sure that this is what happens inside stars. I'd tend to think that the accretion occurred over a period of time, and thus the compression would not be instantaneous. Therefore, we have to consider the effects of slow compression. It seems possible that at extreme temperatures, all of the electrons are unbound. So you just have one big proton/electron soup, but no atomic structures. With gravity exerting 1836 times more force on the protons than on the electrons, the core will be proton-rich and electron-poor, to the limits of electrostatic repulsion between like charges. Personally, I think that this is what prevents gravitational collapse. Anyway, despite the charge separation, is it possible to get protons and electrons packed close enough together that they start to fuse into neutrons, just from the force of gravity? Sure it is, theoretically at least, if the star is heavy enough. But that's not going to produce pure neutronium. If you have the pressure to fuse protons & electrons, you certainly have the pressure, with the help of the weak nuclear force, to fuse neutrons & protons into heavier elements. So even if you have exactly the same number of protons & electrons (which I don't think is the case), I don't think that you'd get free neutrons floating around in there. Furthermore, if you did, what would prevent the gravitational collapse of the star? Neutronium has the density of an atomic nucleus, which is way, way greater than normal matter, which is mainly empty space. The increase in density would create a more powerful gravitational field, which would increase the rate of neutronium production. So once this threshold is crossed, there won't be any stopping it, until all of the matter in the star had been crushed down into neutronium. Supposedly this is what happens in neutron stars. But a typical neutron star has a mass between about 1.4 and 3.2 solar masses. Why are there much more massive stars than that, which haven't collapsed into neutron stars? Neutron stars are thought to be the remnants of supernovae. But when scientists tested thermonuclear bombs in the 1950s, did they ever find a little remnant left in the center? No! The extreme temperatures forced the expansion of the matter. Once expanded, neutrons decay within 15 minutes. So it really isn't reasonable to think that neutrons stars are supernova remnants. Such considerations put neutronium, as a bulk substance outside of a fusion chain, on short notice. Without it, the densest matter possible would be matter compressed to the threshold of the failure of the Coulomb barrier, where the protons are about to give way to the nuclear forces that will pull them in, despite the electrostatic repulsion. I haven't figured out how to calculate this yet, nor have I seen this number quoted anywhere. Lloyd wrote: Thornhill also says that supernovae are electrical double layer explosions, rather than nuclear or other kinds of explosions. Do you agree that supernovae are likely double layer explosions? What's a "double-layer explosion"? In the model that I'm using, there is going to be some sort of threshold, above which there is sufficient gravity to maintain compressive ionization, and thus charged double-layers. The electric force between the layers further compacts the matter, which makes the gravity field more dense, which increases the compressive ionization. Hence this is a force feedback loop, and this accounts for the coherency of plasma in a star, at temperatures that would seem to preclude condensed matter. OK... so as time goes on, mass loss due to stellar winds is going to whittle the thing down. As the pressure relaxes, charges are able to recombine, and this produces the heat and light that we get from stars. Maybe as the mass approaches the minimum threshold for the compressive ionization, more and more charge recombination occurs. As the temperature increases, the plasma expands, reducing the density of the gravitational field, and thus enabling even more charge recombination. Could this produce a catastrophic failure of the force feedback loop that is holding the star together? Perhaps. Would it be so catastrophic as to be explosive? Well, maybe. Would it be catastrophic on the scale of a supernova? That wouldn't be my first guess, but it might be possible. Aside from catastrophic charge recombination, there is one other possible cause for supernovae: stellar collisions. In cases where there is a dimming, or a brightening, in the last couple of days before the supernova, it's possible that a planet or a star on final approach subtracted from, or added to, the brightness of the primary star. Hence models of normal stellar life cycles don't necessarily have to include a self-destruct mechanism at the end of the cycle — the "normal" cycle might typically end just in a brief flash due to catastrophic charge recombination, followed by a red giant phase for a while, or the star might simply go dark. Lloyd wrote: Do you think the size and density of nebulae would primarily determine the maximum possible density of a star core that forms from a nebula? If so, do you have any clues about what might be the maximum possible size and density of a nebula? I haven't made a detailed study of planetary nebulae — I just looked at them briefly when I was studying bipolar jets, and then I put them in the "natural tokamak" category. I don't see any reason why there would be a theoretical limit. Nor do I see (perhaps in my ignorance?) a difference in kind between planetary nebulae, white dwarfs, neutron stars, pulsars, magnetars, black holes, quasars, and AGNs. I think that those are all natural tokamaks, at different scales, and with different properties, depending on whether or not they're currently feeding, how fast they're spinning, etc. But I don't have any reason to believe that it wouldn't be possible for an entire galaxy to implode into one of these things. Lloyd wrote: Have you stated on your website what the conditions would likely be for formation of your natural tokamak within your collapsing nebula? Do you know what would be about the minimum size and density possible for such a tokamak? The critical factor would be the angular velocities. If the matter is rotating fast enough, it will generate powerful enough magnetic fields to confine the plasma. White dwarfs fit into this category, being small, but rotating fast enough to generate magnetic fields of over a million Gauss. Lloyd wrote: Do you have any reason to doubt Arp's and Thornhill's models of galaxy formation from quasars, and quasar formation within galactic nuclei? Since they consider that the nuclei act as plasma guns that shoot out low-mass high-speed highly ionized quasars, which then gain mass and lose velocity and ionization, I assume those conclusions are based on their observations of quasars. So would your tokamak also be able to shoot out plasmoids like that, such as quasars or stars? I "think" that Arp was just observing that the redshifts of quasars suggest that they're moving away from the AGNs, which by extension suggests that the AGNs ejected the quasars. Aside from the fact that the extreme redshift data have been challenged, calling the AGN a plasma gun doesn't add much specificity. My "natural tokamak" construct provides for bipolar jets, which could sputter if the fuel supply from the accretion disc was unsteady. But it doesn't provide for an accretion in the ejecta. There "seems" to be evidence that the bipolar jets are ionized, so the Coulomb force should discourage condensation. For there to be any post-ejection pinching (much less any "focus fusion"), the jets would have to accelerate, such that the magnetic fields would increase. None of the jets show pinching, nor acceleration. The eventual randomization of the jets at some distance away is evidence that the organizing principle (i.e., the magnetic field) diminished, which means that the plasma stream is decelerating. So I don't see any evidence of star or quasar formation in bipolar jets (nebular or galactic). Doesn't mean it isn't there — just means that there isn't any evidence of it. Lloyd wrote: I just found this site about plasma astronomy, but have only skimmed through it a bit. Looks potentially interesting. That looks like a great site! I added it to my catalog, and I'll check it out in the next couple of days.
'12-11-04, 22:33 Lloyd	Re: Call for Criticisms on New Solar Model Charles, how many neutrons do you figure clump together when fusion produces neutronium? I think I've read others, maybe Kanarev, say that neutrons tend to clump a bit, having a small amount of mutual "attraction". When you use the term "black hole", you probably confuse people, who are likely to suppose that you mean the conventional definition of black hole. Whereas, I believe your definition is considerably different, although the result is fairly similar. What's similar is that your black hole would not give off any radiation, but I think it would be detectable if it were observed from a moving object, on which the observer could see light objects behind the black hole get occulted. So why not rename your black hole something that won't confuse people? It's not really a hole. Call it a blackbody. Okay, that's already got another definition too. Then how about a black star? Do you still think pulsars are neutron stars? Well, I suppose we shouldn't try to figure that one out right now, since your plate is probably full enough as it is. But I'll resume disagreeing with you about that later, when you get time, if you don't mind. Here's what a Cassiopia A TPOD says about double layer explosions. Is it clear enough? Or another "good like that"? Flares are the result of double layers that form and explode in one or a few of the Birkeland currents in a star's corona or photosphere. Those double layers arise from current surges that are generated in local instabilities. Novas and supernovas may be double layers that explode from the entire surface of a star. They are like cosmic sparks that "jump the gap" when instabilities switch off the current in galactic Birkeland filaments. The sudden interruption of current in such transmission lines will cause the energy that is distributed throughout the circuit to be dumped into the spark that bridges the gap. The resulting explosion will dissipate more energy than was originally present in the circuit element that "blew"—in this case, the star. Quasars. Have you read any of Arp's books or articles? I think you've at least read one of his articles. I read one or two articles plus one of his books. The book seemed to be very thorough in working out the life-cycle of a galaxy from a quasar. I'm skeptical that he based the idea of quasars' initial high velocity on the red shift data. How sure are you about that? He talked about the red shift being quantized, which was due to change in ionization, I believe. It seems very unlikely that he would have concluded that the velocities of quasars could change abruptly in major amounts. For each step down in velocity each quasar would have to run into a brick wall periodically. The angelfire site I mentioned last time discusses galaxies collapsing by emitting quasars, but I don't think that's what Arp or Thornhill contends. They seem to suggest that the biggest galaxies have the most daughter galaxies as offsprings, which all started out as quasars. And a big galaxy would not be a collapsed one. But I haven't read that webpage thoroughly, so I may have gotten misconceptions. Your stellar model has a dense positive core stripped of electrons by gravitational compressive ionization. I mentioned to you before that I don't think electrons orbit atomic nuclei, but Kanarev's model of atoms would still allow electrons to be stripped off, even though his electrons don't orbit. Instead, they hover above the protons, due to a balance between magnetic attraction and electrical repulsion (or vice versa?). He has the proton as being a small dense torus and the electron being a large sparse torus. I posted quite a bit about it, including diagrams, at http://thunderbolts.info/forum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=3&amp~ early last year. (Mathis has the proton as a large torus, or disk, and the electron as a smaller sphere revolving around the axis of the proton, but above it or below it. If a sphere does that fast enough, if looks like a torus, so maybe that's what Kanarev's finding actually was.)