Electric Sun Discussions

[CharlesChandler]

I wonder how consistent the location of these "jet streams" is...

In this movie...

http://spd.boulder.swri.edu/solar_mystery/mov2k9.mpg

...the "jet streams" are constantly shifting, but they consistently move toward the equator, and supposedly when they cross the latitude of 22 degrees, sunspots start erupting.

But I'm still scratching my head on this. This "jet stream" is tearing along at a blinding 5 m/s? I've witnessed civil servants moving faster than that. The equatorial velocity of the Sun is about 2000 m/s, so this is a variation of 0.25%, and this begs a number of questions. First, did they really get measurements that accurate, at a depth of 7000 km? Second, what difference would 0.25% make? It would be interesting if a causal relationship between these "jet" streams and sunspot activity continues to appear in subsequent studies. But determining the mechanistic nature of that relationship requires that we keep the numbers in perspective.

I would have to believe that the solid crust is actually relatively thin.

The thing that I don't understand about solid crust models is how you explain differential rotation. Here are the data:

http://qdl.scs-inc.us/2ndParty/Images/C ... _4_wbg.png

The following image shows one quadrant of differential rotation in 3D. The sphere at the center denotes the core, about which we know little. The flat plane in the radiative zone reveals its solid body rotation. In the convective zone, equatorial plasma is accelerated, while polar plasma is decelerated.

http://qdl.scs-inc.us/2ndParty/Images/C ... ion_3D.png

With the equator rotating once in 25 days, and the poles taking 34 days to make the same full turn, you'd have a heckuva buckle in a solid crust just in a matter of days.

Sunspot activity suggests that the 'shiny" layer of the photosphere is only about 500KM thick, at which point we should observe another rapid drop in temperature. This drop in temperature under the photosphere is verified in sunspot activity since sunspots often contains *lower* temperature plasma in the umbra of the sunspot.

This is the standard interpretation, but I think that it is incorrect. Typically there is, indeed, a 700 km dip in the level of the plasma at the center of a sunspot, which can be as cool as 3000 K. This lends itself to the notion that the photosphere is only 700 km deep, and that something about sunspot brushes back the photosphere, revealing a cooler layer underneath. But I don't see that this makes sense, in anybody's model. In the standard model, photons are radiating outward from a fusion furnace, losing intensity by the inverse square law. If the center of a sunspot reveals a lower layer, it should be hotter, not cooler. Furthermore, the standard model has the topmost 700 km as thinner than a laboratory vacuum, only reaching the density of STP air at a depth of 15,000 km. So the photons travel 696,000 km from the center of the Sun, staying pretty dark and stuff, and then in the last 700 km, in a near-perfect vacuum, all of a sudden they jack up the temperature, from 3000 to 6000 K??? And this temperature stratification is stable, even with granules completely recirculating the plasma every 20 minutes??? (If you're going to smoke stuff like that, you're gonna have to share.) And if the source of the heat is the corona, anything exposed to the corona should get the same amount of heat, and there's no brushing back the photosphere to reveal a cooler layer beneath.

In my model, there is a steady stream of electrons from the cathode through the positive double-layer on top. This flow of current creates ohmic heating which is the source of the black-body radiation. The cathode actually sits on a current divider, where the electrons are pulled down by their attraction to a layer of liquid ions below, and pulled upward toward the heliosphere by its positive charge. Electrons moving upward, away from this current divider, move slowly at first, and accelerate as they go, because the further they get from the divider, the less ambiguous the field. In the quiet Sun, these slow-moving electrons are evenly dispersed by their own electrostatic repulsion, but the stronger currents in sunspots produce electrodynamic effects. Specifically, the electrons rise in the presence of the Sun's overall magnetic field. The clash between that field and the fields generated by the rising electrons produces a Lorentz force that puts the electrons into a spiraling motion. The spiral then accentuates the Sun's magnetic field, cranking it up to over 4000 Gauss, and establishing solenoidal lines of force centered on the sunspot. In this framework, 3000 K in the umbra makes perfect sense. The electric current flowing up through the photosphere toward the heliosphere typically generates 6000 K of ohmic heating, but if it falls into a spiraling pattern, there is less ohmic heating in the center of the spiral, because there are fewer electrons there.

[Lloyd]

Liquid Plasma Photosphere
* I started a new thread called Liquid Hydrogen Plasma Star Model at http://www.thunderbolts.info/wp/forum/phpB ... =10&t=6711. I first intended to post that message here, but I didn't want it to interfere with this discussion. But it does seem to make a good case for the photosphere being liquid plasma and for conventional calculations of the temperature being way off by underestimating hidden energies in liquids. So I hope yous may get time to check it out and comment.

[Michael Mozina]

I would have to believe that the solid crust is actually relatively thin.

The thing that I don't understand about solid crust models is how you explain differential rotation. Here are the data:

http://qdl.scs-inc.us/2ndParty/Images/C ... _4_wbg.png

The differential rotation is related to the rotation patterns that are observed in the plasma photosphere, not the solid surface that is about 4800KM under the photosphere. The photosphere is much like a high cloud cover. It moves with the EM field changes in the solar atmosphere as the sun rotates, whereas the surface itself does not. That movement of a charged particle atmosphere past a rigid conductive crust is what generates a lot of the electrical activity in the solar atmosphere IMO.

With the equator rotating once in 25 days, and the poles taking 34 days to make the same full turn, you'd have a heckuva buckle in a solid crust just in a matter of days.

I'll have to round up a link from Thunderbolts in relationship to differential rotation of a plasma. They do a good job explaining the EM effects that cause the outer layers to rotate as they do. It's not really related to the internals of the sun, but with the EM field effects and rotation process of the sun. The crust gets recycled on a regular basis IMO, but not that fast.

Sunspot activity suggests that the 'shiny" layer of the photosphere is only about 500KM thick, at which point we should observe another rapid drop in temperature. This drop in temperature under the photosphere is verified in sunspot activity since sunspots often contains *lower* temperature plasma in the umbra of the sunspot.

This is the standard interpretation, but I think that it is incorrect. Typically there is, indeed, a 700 km dip in the level of the plasma at the center of a sunspot, which can be as cool as 3000 K. This lends itself to the notion that the photosphere is only 700 km deep, and that something about sunspot brushes back the photosphere, revealing a cooler layer underneath. [/QUOTE]

It's the rising "hot" (relatively speaking it's hotter than most) silicon plasma that has expanded and started to rise. Once it reaches the chromosphere/photosphere boundary, the density change is too great for it to continue upwards, so it spreads out and eventually sinks back into the photosphere. It's still "cooler" the the top of the photosphere because the whole silicon plasma layer is *much* cooler than the top of the photosphere, just as the average temp of the photosphere is dramatically different from the very top of the chromosphere/corona boundary.

But I don't see that this makes sense, in anybody's model. In the standard model, photons are radiating outward from a fusion furnace, losing intensity by the inverse square law.

Regardless of the energy source in a Birkeland model, it's simply a cathode at the crust and the crust is *much, much, much* cooler than the surface of the photosphere, some 4800 KM above and some 4000 degrees hotter.

If the center of a sunspot reveals a lower layer, it should be hotter, not cooler.

That is true, but it only applies to the *standard* solar theory, not to a Birkeland cathode model. The atmospheric layering is simply a double layer process that is caused by plasma separation based on ion density. Both gravity and EM fields act to mass separate the plasmas, and silicon simply isn't as "bright" as neon in the visual spectrum, and it's much thicker and cooler than the surface of the neon layer.

Furthermore, the standard model has the topmost 700 km as thinner than a laboratory vacuum, only reaching the density of STP air at a depth of 15,000 km.

FYI, that is highly unlikely IMO. The double layering makes the density at the surface of the photosphere *much* greater than assumed by contemporary helioseismology models IMO.

So the photons travel 696,000 km from the center of the Sun, staying pretty dark and stuff, and then in the last 700 km, in a near-perfect vacuum, all of a sudden they jack up the temperature, from 3000 to 6000 K??? And this temperature stratification is stable, even with granules completely recirculating the plasma every 20 minutes??? (If you're going to smoke stuff like that, you're gonna have to share.)

I agree about sharing, but it doesn't actually apply to a mass separated cathode solar model. There is a layering and temperature gradient change at each double layer of course, but all heat is being carried to the surface by the currents that flow between the surface and the heliosphere.

And if the source of the heat is the corona, anything exposed to the corona should get the same amount of heat, and there's no brushing back the photosphere to reveal a cooler layer beneath.

The corona is heated by the coronal loops, and the current streaming off the cathode. The coronal loops bring million degree plasma from below, far up into the upper thin atmosphere. Keep in mind however that the mainstream constantly downplays the significance of Thompson scattering and they often do not recognize the loop as the original light source. They therefore grossly overestimate the coronal temperatures *outside* of the streamers and outside of the current flows concentrations near the edge of the chromosphere. If you look at 211A SDO images however, you'll notices that streamers flow far out into space, so some of the temperature of the corona is directly related to the flow of current off the cathode. As the streamers get further away from the surface, they tend to 'fade away' as the concentration of current drops to lower levels. Even still you'll see a pretty nice coronal streamer from every iron ion wavelength, even a bit in 94A (blurry and short however).

In my model, there is a steady stream of electrons from the cathode through the positive double-layer on top.

We're both in agreement on the cathode aspect. The atmosphere is just a series of current carrying double layers without a net charge IMO.

This flow of current creates ohmic heating which is the source of the black-body radiation.

I agree that the constant current is the major source of BB radiation and non BB radiation for that matter.

The cathode actually sits on a current divider, where the electrons are pulled down by their attraction to a layer of liquid ions below, and pulled upward toward the heliosphere by its positive charge. Electrons moving upward, away from this current divider, move slowly at first, and accelerate as they go, because the further they get from the divider, the less ambiguous the field. In the quiet Sun,........

AFAIK we agree on this part except you have a liquid whereas I have a solid surface somewhere under the photosphere.

..... these slow-moving electrons are evenly dispersed by their own electrostatic repulsion, but the stronger currents in sunspots produce electrodynamic effects.

I think we basically agree on this except it's more than just electrostatic repulsion going on, electrons are attracted to the heliosphere but disperse themselves as they travel further from the cathode source. We both seem to agree that there is net drop in electron density as the volume of the sphere increases (electrons travel further from the cathode source).

Specifically, the electrons rise in the presence of the Sun's overall magnetic field.

In Birkeland's cathode model, the electrons rise because they are attracted to the heliosphere.

The clash between that field and the fields generated by the rising electrons produces a Lorentz force that puts the electrons into a spiraling motion. The spiral then accentuates the Sun's magnetic field, cranking it up to over 4000 Gauss, and establishing solenoidal lines of force centered on the sunspot. In this framework, 3000 K in the umbra makes perfect sense. The electric current flowing up through the photosphere toward the heliosphere typically generates 6000 K of ohmic heating, but if it falls into a spiraling pattern, there is less ohmic heating in the center of the spiral, because there are fewer electrons there.

I "think" we agree on this point.

[CharlesChandler]

The differential rotation is related to the rotation patterns that are observed in the plasma photosphere, not the solid surface that is about 4800KM under the photosphere.

No, the differential rotation extends down to .7 of the solar radius, or 200,000 km under the photosphere. Below that level we see solid body rotation, which means that it could actually be a solid. Above that level, the rate of rotation depends on the altitude. If there's a "solid" crust at a depth of 4800 km, it has been ground into pieces small enough that they flow like a liquid.

It's the rising "hot" (relatively speaking it's hotter than most) silicon plasma that has expanded and started to rise. Once it reaches the chromosphere/photosphere boundary, the density change is too great for it to continue upwards, so it spreads out and eventually sinks back into the photosphere. It's still "cooler" the the top of the photosphere because the whole silicon plasma layer is *much* cooler than the top of the photosphere, just as the average temp of the photosphere is dramatically different from the very top of the chromosphere/corona boundary.

I don't understand this. The silicon heats up, so it rises to the top, and then it spreads out and sinks back down, because it is cooler than the photosphere? I think that you're saying that it is cooler than itself.

Regardless of the energy source in a Birkeland model, it's simply a cathode at the crust and the crust is *much, much, much* cooler than the surface of the photosphere, some 4800 KM above and some 4000 degrees hotter.

So the silicon plasma sitting on the crust gains 4000 degrees, and that's why it rises? Where did it get the heat? You can't call it thermionic emissions, because then the crust would be hotter than the plasma absorbing the heat. That leaves ohmic heating as the crucial conversion, right? I "think" that you'll agree on that, but...

Both gravity and EM fields act to mass separate the plasmas, and silicon simply isn't as "bright" as neon in the visual spectrum, and it's much thicker and cooler than the surface of the neon layer.

The silicon gained 4000 degrees (from ohmic heating?), which is why it rises to the surface, where it finds itself much thicker and cooler that the neon at the surface, so it falls back into the Sun? How does the neon get heated? Does the thicker and cooler silicon heat it up? Or does the ohmic heating preferentially act on the neon? Does ohmic heating increase in thinner plasma?

Furthermore, the standard model has the topmost 700 km as thinner than a laboratory vacuum, only reaching the density of STP air at a depth of 15,000 km.

FYI, that is highly unlikely IMO. The double layering makes the density at the surface of the photosphere *much* greater than assumed by contemporary helioseismology models IMO.

Agreed.

All heat is being carried to the surface by the currents that flow between the surface and the heliosphere.

Agreed, but that doesn't explain how the temperature jumps up 4000 degrees in 4800 km.

Keep in mind however that the mainstream constantly downplays the significance of Thompson scattering and they often do not recognize the loop as the original light source.

It sounds like you're saying that what lights up the photosphere is coronal loops, is that correct? If so, why are the coronal loops so dim that we can only see them if the photosphere is completely eclipsed? And why would the center of sunspots be darker, when they are just as exposed to the coronal loops as the surrounding photosphere?

Specifically, the electrons rise in the presence of the Sun's overall magnetic field.

In Birkeland's cathode model, the electrons rise because they are attracted to the heliosphere.

I agree -- I'm just saying that they are rising (because they are attracted to the heliosphere) in the presence of the Sun's overall magnetic field, which generates a Lorentz force that induces rotation.

In the more general sense, I hate to sound so critical, but if we're going to make any progress here, you have to listen to the logic, and consider the physical implications of what you're saying. You can't just say something over and over again, and expect people to finally come around to your way of seeing things. I think that you have some rare insights into the significances of different types of data. But there are also some disconnects in your model, and until you realize the ramifications of those problems, your model will not move forward.

The people here will not follow you just because of your tenacity. The type of person who would is still following the mainstream, which has longevity on its side. So you can't compete on those grounds. If you come here, you'll find people who are willing to listen to new ideas, but who also are not impressed by band-standing. They are in search of something that makes sense, not just something that sounds good and doesn't seem to be phased by criticisms.

I wouldn't have said anything except for the fact that you have a firm grasp of a lot of useful information, and I think that you're squandering your opportunity to lead this initiative by not acknowledging opportunities to improve the accuracy of your model. You see and understand the problems with the mainstream, and you understand that a major change is in progress. Today's disenfranchised wild-eyed iconoclasts are making tomorrow's pioneering theoretical break-throughs. But do you realize that there might be a Copernicus among us, and that it might be you?

[Lloyd]

Impasse Detour
* I think this is the way to end the impasse. Use the method Juergens used. Make a table of features vs. theories. I found recently that Brown did the same thing with his Hydroplate theory. He actually took it a step further than Juergens by explaining why each theory did or did not explain each feature. See some of the webpages at this link to see how he did his tables: http://www.bing.com/search?q=site%3Ahtt ... BR&pc=MOZI.
* If yous want to try this, I'm willing to help. I suggest doing it on the features that suggest a solid surface under the photosphere. Isn't that the main obstacle to further progress?

[CharlesChandler]

Actually, I think you're right. It's time that everybody go on record with what they're actually saying, and we need to be able to compare the models, apples-to-apples. This is going to turn into a heckuva chore, as it gets complicated. There are a lot of data to explain, and each explanation has its own properties that beg questions. But it's a necessary step. Right now I think that everybody is just basically saying, "There are problems with other people's models, and there's something that's correct about mine, so I don't have to listen to you." Yet somewhere in here is the truth, and if I have something, and you do too, the Real Truth is some sort of combination of both models, minus the flaws in both. So how do we get to the Real Truth? We can't just say that anybody with a model that has something right about it gets to join the club. We have to take all of what's right about each model, lose all of what's wrong, and build a better model. And I think that this is within reach. A lot of people think that it's good enough to just be able to cite fatal flaws in the standard model, and to suggest an alternative. But I'm not looking for the alternative explanation. I'm looking for the truth! And I think that we have enough data, and enough brains amongst us, to work it out. With only 4 fundamental forces, and with mountains of data, there are only so many possibilities. So you propose an hypothesis, and you check to see if the data support it. If not, propose another. Eventually, and especially with more sets of eyes going over the proposals and the data, you'll light upon the construct that can stand up to all of the scrutiny. So like I said, I think that a solution is within reach.

We've done a number of comparisons, but I just went ahead and started a new one from scratch.

http://qdl.scs-inc.us/?top=8751

Once I get that fleshed out a bit, we should discuss how to bring in the other material we have. I'm thinking that a Google Doc is probably the way to go. I just started my doc on my site so I could easily play around with the format. It seems useful to list the known phenomena in a cell that spans all of the columns, and then, for each model to describe its unique explanation of those phenomena in its own column. I also think I like putting counter-points from other people right there in the column where the assertions are being made, rather than in their own column. Anyway, yes we should definitely work together on this. Could you locate the other comparisons, and perhaps set up a Google Doc for this, if you think that such is the way to go?

[Lloyd]

SSBP
I think the main disagreement between the CC and MM models is the SSBP (Solid Surface below photosphere).
So I'd like to start analysis here by focusing on the proposed SSBP. Does this seem reasonable? (I'm not sure because I'm sleep deprived now.)
* The proposed SSBP involves what features? It involves these:
1. solar moss (main feature) (See note below)
* Why do conventional astronomers consider the solar moss feature to be above the photosphere?
* What data proves the solar moss to be below the photosphere?
* If CC agrees with MM on this, why?
2. flickering pixels among the solar moss pixels
* MM's supposition is that they are produced by small coronal loops
* What else might cause the flickering pixels?
3. iron coronal rain
4. coronal loop footpoints
5. stationary tornadoes
6. hot spots
7. active regions
8. anything else?

Note: Solar moss (according to http://www.solarviews.com/cap/sun/moss1.htm) consists of hot gas at about two million degrees Fahrenheit which emits extreme ultraviolet light observed by the TRACE instrument. It occurs in large patches, about 6,000 - 12,000 miles in extent, and appears between 1,000 - 1,500 miles above the Sun's visible surface, sometimes reaching more than 3,000 miles high. It looks "spongy" because the patches are composed of small bright elements interlaced with dark voids in the TRACE images. These voids are caused by jets of cooler gas from the Sun's lower atmosphere, the chromosphere, which is at about 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit. The solar moss appears only below high pressure coronal loops in active regions, typically persisting for tens of hours, but has been seen to form rapidly and spread in association with loops that arise after a solar explosion, called a flare.

[Michael Mozina]

The differential rotation is related to the rotation patterns that are observed in the plasma photosphere, not the solid surface that is about 4800KM under the photosphere.

No, the differential rotation extends down to .7 of the solar radius, or 200,000 km under the photosphere. Below that level we see solid body rotation, which means that it could actually be a solid. Above that level, the rate of rotation depends on the altitude. If there's a "solid" crust at a depth of 4800 km, it has been ground into pieces small enough that they flow like a liquid.

I don't think it's a liquid or we wouldn't see such a persistence in the structures observed in RD images, sometimes spanning many hours and even days. A liquid would 'flow' quite visually in RD imagery and angular structures would be uncommon rather than the 'norm'.

It's the rising "hot" (relatively speaking it's hotter than most) silicon plasma that has expanded and started to rise. Once it reaches the chromosphere/photosphere boundary, the density change is too great for it to continue upwards, so it spreads out and eventually sinks back into the photosphere. It's still "cooler" the the top of the photosphere because the whole silicon plasma layer is *much* cooler than the top of the photosphere, just as the average temp of the photosphere is dramatically different from the very top of the chromosphere/corona boundary.

I don't understand this. The silicon heats up, so it rises to the top, and then it spreads out and sinks back down, because it is cooler than the photosphere? I think that you're saying that it is cooler than itself.

Sorry. Let me try again and simplify a bit. Think for a bit only in terms of one layer of the atmosphere, in this case, a relatively deep silicon layer. The coronal loops traverse the 'atmosphere', heating up specific areas of the atmosphere. The largest loops can sometime concentrate around 'active regions' (I'll leave it at that). When this occurs, the heat around the loop concentration causes the silicon atmosphere to heat up in that region. It creates a process much like occurs on Earth when the heat from the Earth causes hot air to up into the atmosphere where it cools off and eventually disperses itself into the atmosphere. If there is enough turbulence in the atmosphere, we actually start to observe the formation of tornado like vortexes of dense material that will absorb light in 171A as emitted by coronal loops in the atmosphere.

In this case it's not actually the surface itself that is releasing the bulk of the heat into the atmosphere, it's the coronal loop activity that releases heat that is concentrated in one area. Larger active regions can remain active over days and weeks rather than hours. If enough heat is released into the atmosphere from these discharge loops, a column of rising heated silicon plasma starts to form in the atmosphere. There is a volcanic aspect that I'll try to simply ignore, but it does play a role in the atmospheric heating process IMO.

If and only if the loop concentration in the active region remains high, that rising column of heated silicon plasma reaches the neon photosphere, a relatively thin, and light material in comparison to the column of rising silicon plasma. If that column of rising silicon plasma has enough force, or it's supported by large coronal loop activity, and tornado like formations from below, the silicon plasma will actually flow up and through the relatively thin neon layer, like clear air rising up through the cloud cover in the eye of a hurricane.

A sunspot is much like looking down the eye of a hurricane from space. We can 'see through' the cloud cover (neon layer) in that one area where the silicon plasma rises to the top of that surface.

The density gradient between the hot silicon plasma (hot in terms of the average temperature for silicon atmospheric plasma) and the thin neon isn't nearly as great as the density gradient that occurs once the silicon reaches the helium chromosphere. At that surface, the density gradient changes so abruptly that the silicon has nowhere to go but to 'spread out' and it will eventually sink back into the silicon atmosphere.

Does that help? I'll round up some movie again that show the correlation between the angles of large coronal loops and the angles of penumbral filaments around sunspots. You'll notice a correlation. That upward flow of plasma in coronal loops acts to 'push back" the neon atmosphere.

So the silicon plasma sitting on the crust gains 4000 degrees, and that's why it rises? Where did it get the heat?

It's actually silicon plasma that is located *above* the surface, but is located in close proximity to large clusters of coronal loops. In other words the surface is close to 1200K, but the discharge loops are millions of degrees. It's these discharges that dump the bulk of the heat into the atmosphere, not the surface itself. That can of course during volcanic activity IMO. Most of the time however the loops release the bulk of the heat into the atmosphere, not the crust. The crust is a bit player in terms of the net energy release of the solar atmosphere. The bulk of the heat comes from the resistance to electrons streaming from the surface, and from the discharge filament channels in the solar atmosphere.

You can't call it thermionic emissions, because then the crust would be hotter than the plasma absorbing the heat. That leaves ohmic heating as the crucial conversion, right? I "think" that you'll agree on that, but...

If we assume there's a cathode involved, then electrons have to flow through the atmosphere. It is ultimately ohmic heating.

Both gravity and EM fields act to mass separate the plasmas, and silicon simply isn't as "bright" as neon in the visual spectrum, and it's much thicker and cooler than the surface of the neon layer.

The silicon gained 4000 degrees (from ohmic heating?), which is why it rises to the surface, where it finds itself much thicker and cooler that the neon at the surface, so it falls back into the Sun?

The hot silicon eventually reaches the helium chromosphere boundary. At that point the density gradient between silicon and helium is so great that the silicon has nowhere to go but to 'spread out' creating angular holes in the neon where it flares out across the surface of the photosphere.

How does the neon get heated? Does the thicker and cooler silicon heat it up? Or does the ohmic heating preferentially act on the neon? Does ohmic heating increase in thinner plasma?

I think it might be more productive for us to speak in terms of ionization states due to the cathode/anode/current flow process going on between the heliosphere and deeper layers of the sun. That current acts to put both the neon and the silicon plasma into relatively high ionization states. It 'can' but doesn't have to lead to extremely high temperatures, but the heat from the loops has to go somewhere and it will convect up and toward the surface of the photosphere.

Agreed, but that doesn't explain how the temperature jumps up 4000 degrees in 4800 km.

IMO is mostly related to the heat released by the current carrying (million degree) loops. You would get burned by the ion plasma temperature in a discharge channel in the Earth's atmosphere if you didn't get electrocuted first. There is ultimately some resistance to such large currents and the loops generate a lot of atmospheric heat. The also erode huge chucks off the surface as seen in the LMSAL RD image.

It sounds like you're saying that what lights up the photosphere is coronal loops, is that correct?

No. The light source of all iron ion SDO are the loops, but the photosphere is in a state of glow mode discharge due to the currents flowing from the cathode below. It's like a neon light bulb that is lit up by the currents traversing the neon. It's not coronal loops we observe from the photosphere, it's the white light generated by the surface of the photosphere. In the areas where the silicon plasma has displaced the Neon, there is less white light being emitted by the Silicon. It has almost nothing to do with actual ion temperatures IMO.

If so, why are the coronal loops so dim that we can only see them if the photosphere is completely eclipsed?

I think we're discussing streamers seen in white light, and they are just too dim to be seen against the neon photosphere without blocking out the photosphere.

And why would the center of sunspots be darker, when they are just as exposed to the coronal loops as the surrounding photosphere?

Again, it's the neon double layer that is experiencing a glow mode discharge that emits the bulk of the white light that we observe with our eyes. The vast majority of coronal loops produce little or no white light. Most of the light they produce relates to superheated iron ions like 211A, 335A, 171A, 193A, 131A, and 94A. Most of those loops and light sources remain *under* the photosphere and could never be seen in white light images against a much brighter neon photosphere. The 1600A and 1700A images also show light that is related to the glow mode discharge process at the surface of the photosphere and it's not (usually but sometimes) related to coronal loop activity. The interesting part of 1600A images is they 'briefly' show the loops coming up and through the photosphere around sunspot activity if the conditions are just right.

I agree -- I'm just saying that they are rising (because they are attracted to the heliosphere) in the presence of the Sun's overall magnetic field, which generates a Lorentz force that induces rotation.

The only thing I'll add is that those rising electrons are also what put the Neon plasma layer into a glow mode discharge and cause that layer to emit such an abundance of white light. The neon is full of impurities due to the turbulence of the photosphere, and the combined effect is a bright neon layer which sits atop a much 'darker' silicon layer, at least in white light.

In the more general sense, I hate to sound so critical, but if we're going to make any progress here, you have to listen to the logic, and consider the physical implications of what you're saying. You can't just say something over and over again, and expect people to finally come around to your way of seeing things. I think that you have some rare insights into the significances of different types of data. But there are also some disconnects in your model, and until you realize the ramifications of those problems, your model will not move forward.

I hear you, I understand you, and I agree with you. I wouldn't expect you to move forward with something you didn't understand (at least not as I meant it) or didn't agree with. I'd rather you and I just "chat" for awhile and you give me your honest opinions. Whatever happens, happens. If you move my way, great. If I move you way, great. I guarantee you that I usually have the hardest time properly *explaining* the ideas I'm trying to convey, even to those individuals who are open to these ideas. You and I should be able to communicate pretty clearly over time because we aren't hostile towards each others ideas, it's likely that neither one of us properly understands the others model yet. We're still in the communication stage I would say. I'll keep trying to clarify and you keep trying to find the holes in my model.

I will say this much, I owe your model a fair shake and we need have have an open conversation at some point about how you would explain the iron ion imagery, and the persistence of coronal loop activity with a 'liquid' cathode. I think we're actually in agreement that the sun is a cathode with respect to the heliosphere, and that cathode sits under the surface of the photosphere. We agree on the ohmic heating issues. I think we still need to clarify the whole glow mode discharge process as it relates to neon and white light, but we'll get there. About the only thing we'll likely be "pig headed" about is the state of matter at the point of solar moss activity. I'm assuming that's your cathode surface too, but it's a liquid whereas I assume it's solid based on my interpretation of high energy satellite imagery.

The people here will not follow you just because of your tenacity.

I agree. I assume that pretty much everyone here is equally tenacious or they wouldn't even frequent these parts to begin with. It takes quite a thick skin, quite a keen intellect, and more than a little bit of tenacity to see through the BS that the mainstream dishes out on a daily basis. I assume everyone that posts here is my equal as it relates to personal issues and attitudes. At this point it's all about the physics and only the physics.

The type of person who would is still following the mainstream, which has longevity on its side. So you can't compete on those grounds. If you come here, you'll find people who are willing to listen to new ideas, but who also are not impressed by band-standing. They are in search of something that makes sense, not just something that sounds good and doesn't seem to be phased by criticisms.

Just be sure you're criticizing *my* ideas, and not your own misunderstandings of what I'm saying. I'm the first to admit that I'm not always the best communicator of these ideas and I take things for granted that I should not in terms of what I 'think' people already understand. For instance I 'assumed' you understood that the Neon photosphere was experiencing a glow mode discharge because we both agree it's a cathode. I didn't realize the confusion over the white light images until just now. I'm sorry I didn't clearly explain that earlier.

I wouldn't have said anything except for the fact that you have a firm grasp of a lot of useful information, and I think that you're squandering your opportunity to lead this initiative by not acknowledging opportunities to improve the accuracy of your model.

Half of the battle seems to be *correctly* explaining my model and correctly conveying the key points of my model. Most of the criticisms I've taken thus far from EU haters (not you personally) has been 'less than honest" in the sense that they took no time to properly understand it before criticizing it. I appreciate the fact that you've spend a lot of hours trying to understand this model at this point, and yet it's also clear that there are some areas where I have failed to properly convey these ideas. I appreciate your efforts and I will try to do a better job of communicating these ideas and a better job listening to and addressing your criticisms. I actually very much appreciate what you've already done in terms of your efforts to understand my beliefs. I respect your efforts a great deal Charles. I see a *lot* of areas of agreement between us, and only a few areas where we still have some differences. I think however that Birkeland would be quite happy with our conversations about a cathode sun, and he would agree with a lot of both of our models. At this point I have no ego about whether you are right or I am right about the cathode being a solid or a liquid. It's almost (not quite) a minor detail from my perspective. Any recognition at the sun is a cathode is a *huge* improvement over standard theory and *way* more than I will ever get from the vast majority of the population on planet earth. I'm thrilled at the progress we've made in our discussions in understanding each other thus far, and I'm confident with enough time, effort and maybe a beer or two, we'll resolve our scientific differences. I like your honest approach, and I take full responsibility for any failures in communication at this point. I've seen the effort you've made to understand what I'm saying, and I've *really* appreciated it.

You see and understand the problems with the mainstream, and you understand that a major change is in progress. Today's disenfranchised wild-eyed iconoclasts are making tomorrow's pioneering theoretical break-throughs. But do you realize that there might be a Copernicus among us, and that it might be you?

At this point in my life I've come to believe that it is better to work in 'teams' and better to share any "scientific breakthroughs" with others, most importantly those who originally promoted these ideas. After reading through Birkeland's work, it became clear to me that he was the next 'Copernicus', but he's no longer among us. That's how slow the mainstream is as recognizing the value of empirical physics. I just hope I'm not dead before they figure it out.

[Michael Mozina]

I've posted these images in other threads, but I thought they should be here as well.

SDO's 16 megapixel resolution was a giant leap forward in technology over SOHO and Trace. SDO shows the effect the loops have of the surface of the photosphere as they rise up and through, and flow back into that surface. The patterns of magnetism on the surface of the photosphere that are caused by the current in the loops, also match up perfectly with the "bright points" seen in 1600A and 1700A, demonstrating a cause/effect link between the loops and the bright areas on that surface.

Keep in mind that the photosphere is in a glow mode discharge state, with high speed electrons constantly streaming right through the whole layer. The 1600A, 1700A and magnetogram images show the surface of the photosphere, not the discharge loops, whereas the iron ion wavelength images on SDO tend to show the coronal loops, not the surface of the photosphere.

http://www.thesurfaceofthesun.com/images/sdo/mfield.mp4
http://www.thesurfaceofthesun.com/image ... mi-171.mp4
http://www.thesurfaceofthesun.com/image ... 00-131.mp4

The first image shows the magnetic field alignments on the surface of the photosphere using the HMI gear on SDO, overlaid with two iron ion wavelengths, 171A and 193A. What you'll observe is that the surface of the photosphere is black and white only in the areas where the largest loops are located, and those N/S alignments occur right along the trajectory of the loops, exactly as predicted by a subsurface origin of the loops. The second example demonstrates that this alignment occurs in other iron on wavelengths as predicted as well.

The third image is an SDO HMI continuum (white light) image overlaid with a 171A wavelength. You'll notice that the loops tend to flow right down along the penumbral filaments in this image, at exactly the right angles *if* (and only if) the loops are actually descending down into the photosphere. The orientation of 171 loops with the penumbral filaments is certainly no coincidence, it's directly related the orientation of the penumbral filaments. Again, this image is completely consistent with the transition region/subsurface stratification layer being located far under the photosphere. The alignment of the loops with the penumbral filament angles would be meaningless if the base of the loops were actually located a further 1200KM above the photosphere as LMSAL claims.

Pretty much every major prediction that I made related to coronal loop activity, based on very limited SOHO resolution imagery, has now been confirmed in 16 megapixel, high cadence, SDO images. SDO is an absolutely awesome piece of new technology, but it's also the mainstream's worst enemy.

[CharlesChandler]

I'll start with your last comments. You have communicated quite effectively on the topic of not communicating well. The irony is killing me! Perhaps it's just something that computer programmers know all too well, that in intellectual pursuits that take a lot of time, before you're very deep into it, you've already lost the ability to explain it to someone else. That's because your forget about every single little logical twist that it took to get you to your current position. So you rattle off the things that make up your current conscious framework, and it makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. So how do I know such things? Take a guess! Anyway, such is why we need to expose our reasoning, and when we think we're done, we have to revisit all of the logical steps, and make sure we didn't miss anything. You said it better than me -- I'm just agreeing. Anyway...

I also totally agree about working in teams, such as we have been. An off-hand comment from somebody who actually listened can sometimes save months or years of blind alleys. No individual is perfect, but the chance of two people making the same mistake at the same time is small. So if we catch each other's errors, we can do work that just wouldn't be possible as individuals.

Just be sure you're criticizing *my* ideas, and not your own misunderstandings of what I'm saying.

Sorry for the verbosity, but I just HAVE to chime in on this, because this is SO true. You try to explain something to people, and the way they have it conceived, it isn't going to work, so they announce that you're wrong. Yet THEY'RE the ones who just conceived something that isn't going to work... How is that your fault??? Anyway, I "try" to keep this in mind before criticizing others, though I'm not perfect. OK, like you said, it's about the physics...

For a second, let's forget about the whole solid/liquid thing, because as you said, there are many things about these models that would be the same either way. So I'd like to focus on the energy sources for a bit. We agree that the Sun is a cathode, emitting electrons headed for the heliosphere, and generating ohmic heating on their way. What I don't get about your model is that you also have coronal loops generating heat, and I don't fully understand the balance of these two energy sources. I consider the coronal loops to be specific to active regions, and as such, cannot be responsible for more than 0.1% of the Sun's power output, as that is the total difference between the active and quiet phases. Is that assessment incorrect? In other words, are you contending that coronal loops are major players, even in the quiet Sun? If not, they have to be eliminated from the energy budget. They might still tell us a lot about the structure of the Sun, as somehow, the same stuff that powers the quiet Sun gets active every now and again. But are coronal loops primary energy sources, or artifacts of the activity?

The second aspect of the energy sources that I'm questioning is how the neon layer gets so hot. Are you saying that it's the topmost 700 km? It seems that you're saying that the Wilson depression in sunspots, which is typically 700 km, reveals the underlying layer, which can be 3000 K cooler, and which in your model is silicon. But I don't see how ohmic heating would have that kind of effect on the topmost 700 km, and leave the underlying layer (4800~700 km) so much cooler. The source of the electrons in your model is the iron at a depth of 4800 km, right?

One other thing that I'd like to mention this round is that your description of the silicon convection uses purely thermodynamic terminology. I "think" that we both agree that the density gradient in the topmost 4800 km is inexplicable by the ideal gas laws. In the Dalsgaard model, the topmost 15,000 km is thinner than STP air, but that wouldn't produce a distinct limb. So I "think" that we agree that the visible layer of the Sun is a cathode tuft, where the electric force is pulling the positive ions toward the cathode far more forcefully than gravity ever could, creating a sharp drop-off in density. Then, electron drag can set up the supersonic velocities in the Rayleigh-Benard cells, which thermodynamics cannot. Anyway, I'll question you more on that later, but first I need clarification on the energy sources.

We need to have an open conversation at some point about how you would explain the iron ion imagery, and the persistence of coronal loop activity with a 'liquid' cathode.

I think that the persistence of the coronal loops is just a function of the persistent of the active regions. These IMO are places where the solar-heliospheric electric current has gotten vigorous enough for electrodynamics. The upward flow of electrons experiences a Lorentz force, because they are flowing upward in the presence of the Sun's overall magnetic field. This induces a spiral, which then accentuates the local magnetic field, so it all resolves into an organized (and thus persistent) system. This is the same current that powers the quiet Sun, but during the periods of inactivity, the electrons just drift slowly away from the current divider, and such electrodynamics do not come into play.

The iron lines IMO are telling us not that the iron is extremely hot, but rather, that it is highly ionized by the powerful electric field, and by the current flowing through it.

I think we're actually in agreement that the sun is a cathode with respect to the heliosphere, and that cathode sits under the surface of the photosphere. We agree on the ohmic heating issues. I think we still need to clarify the whole glow mode discharge process as it relates to neon and white light, but we'll get there.

Yep.

About the only thing we'll likely be "pig headed" about is the state of matter at the point of solar moss activity.

I don't have an "explanation" per se for solar moss, though I'm contending that the iron-to-hydrogen ratio is 1-to-30,000. So I consider the moss to be like clouds floating around in a hydrogen atmosphere, and like clouds in the Earth's atmosphere, they don't need a really great reason to persist. I "think" that they are evidence of electric field density, as they are capable of a higher degree of ionization than the lighter elements. Hence in a more powerful field, they'll be attracted more forcefully. But that begs its own set of new questions. Why would there be a variation in the E-field density? How much variation is it? The moss seems to prefer active regions, so if this approach is correct, there should be some useful information there. But I really haven't gotten deeply into this, so these are just ideas I'm bouncing around.

[Lloyd]

MM on Heat from Coronal Loops
* Hi Charles.

You said to MM: What I don't get about your model is that you also have coronal loops generating heat, and I don't fully understand the balance of these two energy sources. I consider the coronal loops to be specific to active regions, and as such, cannot be responsible for more than 0.1% of the Sun's power output, as that is the total difference between the active and quiet phases. Is that assessment incorrect? In other words, are you contending that coronal loops are major players, even in the quiet Sun?

* If you had time to search through the previous discussions here in this thread, I think you'd find the answer pretty quick. I'm rather sure that he said in several of our discussions that he thinks the coronal loops occur all over the iron surface, but mostly as small loops and I believe his most direct evidence of that are the flickering pixels in the solar moss images. So I'm pretty sure he thinks the small ubiquitous loops are major players as a heat source.

Solid Appearing Solar Moss

You said: Michael Mozina wrote:About the only thing we'll likely be "pig headed" about is the state of matter at the point of solar moss activity.

I don't have an "explanation" per se for solar moss, though I'm contending that the iron-to-hydrogen ratio is 1-to-30,000. So I consider the moss to be like clouds floating around in a hydrogen atmosphere, and like clouds in the Earth's atmosphere, they don't need a really great reason to persist.

* In my nearby LPSM thread at http://thunderbolts.info/wp/forum/phpBB3/v ... =10&t=6711 I quoted under the heading, "Solar Structures":

- It is noteworthy that when hydrogen is shock-compressed, and thereby submitted to extreme pressures (>140 GPa) and temperatures (3000 K), it is able to under[go?] pressure ionization. In so doing, hydrogen assumes a liquid metallic state, as revealed by its greatly increased conductivity.
… As a result, metallic hydrogen should be able to assume a variety of lattice structures, with varying interatomic distances, in a manner which depends primarily on temperature and pressure. It is likely that future extensions of these findings to liquid metallic hydrogen will enable the calculation of various possible structures within the liquid phase itself. This may be important in helping us understand the nature of Sunspots and stellar luminosities, particularly when magnetic field effects are added to the problem.

* So I gather that Robitaille may agree with you that liquid hydrogen may produce somewhat persistent structures.

You said: The moss seems to prefer active regions, so if this approach is correct, there should be some useful information there.

* I think Michael and Brant consider the solar moss to cover the entire solid surface of the Sun, but I did find at http://www.solarviews.com/cap/sun/moss1.htm that it says:

Solar moss consists of hot gas at about two million degrees Fahrenheit which emits extreme ultraviolet light observed by the TRACE instrument [and] occurs in large patches, about 6,000 - 12,000 miles in extent, and appears between 1,000 - 1,500 miles above the Sun's visible surface [i.e. above the photosphere, I think], sometimes reaching more than 3,000 miles high. ... The solar moss appears only below high pressure coronal loops in active regions, typically persisting for tens of hours, but has been seen to form rapidly and spread in association with loops that arise after a solar explosion, called a flare.

It also says: [Solar moss] looks "spongy" because the patches are composed of small bright elements interlaced with dark voids in the TRACE images. These voids are caused by jets of cooler gas from the Sun's lower atmosphere, the chromosphere, which is at about 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit.

Simple Proof of MM's & BC's Solid Surface Models
* I think all it would take to show that the surface is solid is to show that the persistent solar moss features take the same amount of time to complete one rotation. Solid objects rotate in the same time at all latitudes, but liquids and gases have differential rotation, rotating more slowly at higher latitudes. So can you guys find solar moss images at different latitudes, say around 0 and 45 degrees, that take the same amount of time to make one rotation? Brant had predicted recently that this would be found by the mainstream, I think in the near future. It would be neat if you guys could find the smoking gun first. I dare yous to try.

[CharlesChandler]

I'm rather sure that he said in several of our discussions that he thinks the coronal loops occur all over the iron surface, but mostly as small loops and I believe his most direct evidence of that are the flickering pixels in the solar moss images. So I'm pretty sure he thinks the small ubiquitous loops are major players as a heat source.

OK, but that causes more problems than it solves.

1. Interpreting iron emissions strictly as temperature is contentious.
   1. If we do, we need not constrain ourselves to thinking that it's just coronal loops that are hotter. This image shows the Sun in 171 Å emissions from Fe IX/X, which have ionic temperatures of about 1.5 MK. But it's not just the active regions emitting this frequency -- it's everything!
   2. When combined with the SDO "first light" imagery, both Michael & I interpret this image as a face-on view of the dense layer beginning at a depth of 4800 km. Michael would go on to say that the apparent opacity of this layer means that we're looking a pure iron, and we don't see the overlying silicon & neon because they can't absorb Fe IX/X emissions.
   3. But then the temperature of the "iron crust" is 1.5 MK, not the 1200 K that Michael asserts elsewhere, and the crust isn't exactly going to be solid anymore at 1.5 MK.
   4. It also isn't going to emit 5525 K black-body radiation.
   5. So if Fe IX/X emissions are a direct measure of temperature, it isn't just in the coronal loops -- it's everywhere, and then nothing makes sense.
   6. The only other interpretation of these distinctive emissions, which remains possible even when other data are taken into account, is that iron ionization is not evidence of high temperatures, but rather, of an extremely powerful electric field. Then we can have Fe IX/X at the ambient temperature (5525 K or whatever) peacefully co-existing with whatever else is there, without such huge discrepancies in temperatures measured by different means.
   7. That "powerful electric field" is important in explaining many other things. For example, the supersonic speeds in the granules defy explanation in purely thermodynamic terms, but make a lot of sense if there is an electric current flowing through the plasma, where electron drag accelerates atoms above the speed of sound. But once pulled away from the underlying electrode, the positive ions shed out of the electron stream, and fall back into the Sun at over 7 km/s, which can only be evidence of ions responding to a powerful electric field.
2. If arc discharges are occurring constantly, why do they only affect the neon? The layers in MM's model are:
   
   1. 0~700 km: neon at 6000 K
   2. 700~4800 km: silicon at 3000 K
   3. 4800~? km: iron at 1200 K
   Never mind the discrepancy between 1200 K and 1.5 MK for the iron. Just going on the model temps, half of the ohmic heating is acting on that topmost 700 km, which is only 15% of the stuff above the "iron crust". You might say that the discharges prefer the reduced resistance in the thinner neon. So the current starts at the iron crust, comes up through the silicon, arcs across the neon, and then dives back through the silicon to get back to the iron crust. But that's traveling through 4800 * 2 = 9600 km of resistor, just to create an arc less than 1000 km long in the neon (and hence only occupying 1 pixel in the images). Something about that just doesn't sound correct.
3. In the more general sense, what is causing these arc discharges, from the iron crust, to the iron crust? Iron at 1200 K should be a pretty fair conductor, and the current should be pretty happy just flowing through the iron. In fact, it should be pretty hard to develop any electrostatic potential at all in the presence of such conductivity. Here MM cites Birkeland's terrella experiments as evidence that such discharges can occur. But Birkeland used powerful magnetic fields to guide discharges from one point on the sphere, to another point. Between active regions, we have such fields, but in the quiet Sun, with just 1 Gauss, they just aren't there. So if you have a discharge going on, for some other reason (such as from the Sun to the heliosphere, as MM and I agree), you can redirect that discharge back to the Sun with powerful magnetic fields. But without the fields, you don't get the redirection. Then you're left without an explanation for arc discharges in the near-perfect conductivity of solid iron (or 6000 K plasma for that matter).
4. IMO, there is only one possible conclusion. Surface-to-surface arc discharges are insignificant side-effects of extremely powerful magnetic fields in active regions. They are not major players outside of active regions, nor are they even present in the quiet Sun. Since the active Sun only puts out 0.1% more power, such phenomena don't figure significantly in the overall energy budget. The average total solar power output (4.7 × 1025 W of 5525 K black-body radiation) can be attributed (to within 1/2 an order of magnitude in 25) to ohmic heating from the electric current between the Sun and the heliosphere. So that's the prime mover, and that's the current that can, in rare cases, become robust enough to generate concentrated magnetic fields in active regions. So this way, it all makes sense.

It is noteworthy that when hydrogen is shock-compressed, and thereby submitted to extreme pressures (>140 GPa) and temperatures (3000 K), it is able to under[go?] pressure ionization. In so doing, hydrogen assumes a liquid metallic state, as revealed by its greatly increased conductivity. […] As a result, metallic hydrogen should be able to assume a variety of lattice structures, with varying interatomic distances, in a manner which depends primarily on temperature and pressure. It is likely that future extensions of these findings to liquid metallic hydrogen will enable the calculation of various possible structures within the liquid phase itself. This may be important in helping us understand the nature of Sunspots and stellar luminosities, particularly when magnetic field effects are added to the problem.

I don't think that such pressures are present in the first couple thousand kilometers down, so I don't think that this will help us understand granules, sunspots, or other near-surface features.

I think all it would take to show that the surface is solid is to show that the persistent solar moss features take the same amount of time to complete one rotation. Solid objects rotate in the same time at all latitudes, but liquids and gases have differential rotation, rotating more slowly at higher latitudes. So can you guys find solar moss images at different latitudes, say around 0 and 45 degrees, that take the same amount of time to make one rotation? Brant had predicted recently that this would be found by the mainstream, I think in the near future. It would be neat if you guys could find the smoking gun first. I dare yous to try.

I agree. And just tracking features through half of one complete rotation would probably be sufficient, as differential rotation is enough to see in that period.

[Lloyd]

* Hopefully, Michael and or Brant will get time to respond here before long. Meanwhile, ready for some questions, Charles? ...

Solar Moss Location?
* Again, this site http://www.solarviews.com/cap/sun/moss1.htm says:
"Solar moss ... occurs in large patches, about 6,000 - 12,000 miles in extent and appears between 1,000 - 1,500 miles above the [photosphere] ... only below high pressure coronal loops in active regions"

CC said: When combined with the SDO "first light" imagery, both Michael & I interpret this image as a face-on view of the dense layer beginning at a depth of 4800 km.

* What convinces you that that layer is 4800 km below TOP (top of photosphere) instead of above the photosphere as per the above quote in red?

Solar Moss Lattice below TOP?
Robitaille wrote: [W]hen hydrogen is shock-compressed, and thereby submitted to extreme pressures (>140 GPa) and temperatures (3000 K), it is able to under[go?] pressure ionization ... [and] should be able to assume a variety of lattice structures....

CC replied: I don't think that such pressures are present in the first couple thousand kilometers down, so I don't think that this will help us understand granules, sunspots, or other near-surface features.

* Could Robitaille's shock compression affect your layer at 4800 km below TOP?

Phase & Temp?

CC said: Interpreting iron emissions strictly as temperature is contentious. ... [An] image shows the Sun in 171 Å emissions from Fe IX/X, which have ionic temperatures of about 1.5 MK. But it's not just the active regions emitting this frequency -- it's everything! ... [T]hen the temperature of the "iron crust" is 1.5 MK, not the 1200 K that Michael asserts elsewhere, and the crust isn't exactly going to be solid anymore at 1.5 MK.

1. The Robitaille paper concludes that the entire Sun is over 1 MK. Wouldn't that suit your model? Isn't his idea reasonable that temperature of liquid plasma is harder to detect?
2. And would your model be able to accept a liquid hydrogen photosphere like Robitaille's paper has it?
3. Can liquid hydrogen plasma be positive, such as by being 90% neutral and 10% protons, or something like that?
4. He said gases can't boil and don't have distinct surfaces, so how can the photosphere be a gas plasma?
5. I read that the density of liquid hydrogen is .07 g/cm^3. I think that's at STP. Under pressure it reaches 1.4 g/cm^3 or so, I think you said. Any idea what the pressure would be at 4,800 km below TOP? Since the TOP shows surface waves, or tsunamis, as well as flare explosions etc, wouldn't that provide the shock compression needed to form lattice structures (solar moss) in liquid hydrogen plasma?

No Small Loops at 4,800 km below TOP?
* Your reasoning sounds good for why there would be no small loops far below TOP (although Michael's website has a NASA animation of loops that are shown starting below TOP and going on up through TOP into the upper solar atmosphere), but do you have an idea what would produce the bright flickering pixels in the satellite images (which Michael interprets as small coronal loops on the subphotosphere solar moss layer, apparently because they have the same color as the coronal loops)?

[Michael Mozina]

What I don't get about your model is that you also have coronal loops generating heat, and I don't fully understand the balance of these two energy sources.

Every electrical discharge results in resistance and heat. It might be more accurate to say that coronal loops simply transfer energy in the form of electrical current from the core that comes up through the crust, into an atmospheric fireworks display that releases huge amounts of energy in the form of heat into the solar atmosphere. There is some amount of fusion that occurs in the larger discharge events, but it's likely to be a minor factor IMO. The transition of electrical discharge current into atmospheric heat is taking place in coronal loops. Most of the loops are quite "small" in size, say a few kilometers, and less than a single pixel in an SDO image.

I consider the coronal loops to be specific to active regions, and as such, cannot be responsible for more than 0.1% of the Sun's power output, as that is the total difference between the active and quiet phases. Is that assessment incorrect?

In terms of the percent of energy that is actually generated locally by the loops in fusion, probably so. In terms of transferring huge amounts of energy from the core to the outer atmosphere however, they are the primary energy transfer mechanism IMO.

In other words, are you contending that coronal loops are major players, even in the quiet Sun? If not, they have to be eliminated from the energy budget. They might still tell us a lot about the structure of the Sun, as somehow, the same stuff that powers the quiet Sun gets active every now and again. But are coronal loops primary energy sources, or artifacts of the activity?

They are artifacts of the release of electrical energy in the core, just as the steady stream of current from the surface is an artifact of energy releases in the core. The loops are a primary transport mechanism is terms of moving energy from the core to the outside atmosphere of the sun, just as the glow mode discharge process is a major player in the transport of heat into the solar atmosphere. The active regions can release enough excess energy to create sunspots in the atmosphere. All the convection we see at the surface of the photosphere is caused by heat released in coronal loop activity, and in the glow mode discharge to the heliosphere IMO. The crust is actually quite "cool" in comparison to the chromosphere or photosphere.

The second aspect of the energy sources that I'm questioning is how the neon layer gets so hot. Are you saying that it's the topmost 700 km?

All the heat released in the 4800KM atmosphere has to exit that surface, along with all the excess heat released in the glow mode discharge process. The cathode sets up a particle flow that moves excess heat away from the crust, and out of the surface of the photosphere. It's the combined heat from the resistance of the glow mode discharge and the heat release in coronal loops that results in such a high surface temperature of the surface of the photosphere IMO. The Neon layer is about 500-700KM in thickness, whereas the silicon plasma layer is close to 4000KM. There may (or may not) be a thin calcium layer under the silicon, but I'm starting to wonder if there is a calcium layer at all.

It seems that you're saying that the Wilson depression in sunspots, which is typically 700 km, reveals the underlying layer, which can be 3000 K cooler, and which in your model is silicon. But I don't see how ohmic heating would have that kind of effect on the topmost 700 km, and leave the underlying layer (4800~700 km) so much cooler. The source of the electrons in your model is the iron at a depth of 4800 km, right?

Right. Keep in mind that the density of the plasma has a direct effect on the ohmic heating throughout the layers. The reason the chromosphere is hotter than the photosphere is because helium is thinner and therefore more resistant to the flow of current than the neon photosphere. Likewise the silicon plasma double layer is considerably thicker, cooler and more dense than the neon photosphere.

I have to stop here for the time being, but I'll pickup where I left off as I get time.

[CharlesChandler]

What convinces you that that layer is 4800 km below TOP (top of photosphere) instead of above the photosphere?

The image that I cited shows this smooth "surface" (away from the active regions). It doesn't look like the chaotic turbulence of the granular layer, which in my model is that topmost 4800 km. So qualitatively speaking I'd say that we're looking at the far more dense layer below 4800 km, that hasn't erupted in turbulence, and that has a nice smooth "surface." In my model this is highly compressed plasma, while in Michael's, it's the iron crust. But I "think" we're both thinking that it's the same depth (4800 km).

Could Robitaille's shock compression affect your layer at 4800 km below TOP?

A shock wave only temporarily alters the pressure (and thus the density). After it passes through, everything goes back to normal. So for the resting conditions, we wouldn't consider transient effects like that. This leaves us without any built-in explanation for the "persistent structures" in the solar moss. I actually "think" that solar moss isn't a "structure" at all, but just a concentration of iron ions, as a function of electric field density. I really need to think that through all of the way, as this is just going to keep coming up... But if we take the spectral data at face value, iron is only 1 part per 30,000 of hydrogen at TOP. Clouds in the Earth's atmosphere, with 1 part per 100 of water molecules, are a lot more "solid" than that, if that's what it is. If the moss does occur only in active regions, I wouldn't be surprised to see the differences in E-field density that could cause concentrations of ions. But I need to read a couple of papers on the topic, to get all of the facts, before I actually develop an opinion.

1. The Robitaille paper concludes that the entire Sun is over 1 MK. Wouldn't that suit your model? Isn't his idea reasonable that temperature of liquid plasma is harder to detect?

In a supercritical fluid, which is ionized by compression, the standard method for measuring temperature (i.e., degree of ionization) doesn't take compressive ionization into account, and therefore returns falsely high results. There is a sense in which ionization actually cools the plasma, because under intense Coulomb forces, all of the degrees of freedom are removed, and all of the atoms are brought to a stand-still. Where does all of that heat go? All of the kinetic energy stored in atomic motion has been converted to electrostatic potential. How do we get that heat back? Relax the pressure, and the electrons will flow back in, and the charge recombination generates heat. So all of the energy is conserved.

But Robitaille is talking about the understated heat of liquids, where degrees of freedom have been removed by the van der Waals forces. Break those bonds and you release a lot of energy, hence the thermal potential of the liquid is not correctly assessed. Yet at 1 MK, that's not a liquid -- it's a supercritical fluid, and van der Waals forces are not a factor, because the electrons are no longer bound to the atoms at that temperature. So I think that he's using liquid laws that aren't applicable to such high temperatures.

He makes some excellent points about gases not being able to produce black-body radiation, and I think that his conception of liquids is functionally similar to my references to supercritical fluids. But if you want the behaviors of something that has a high density, at 6000+ K, it isn't a liquid that you're talking about.

2. And would your model be able to accept a liquid hydrogen photosphere like Robitaille's paper has it?

The only difference is that I have a highly ionized plasma, strongly attracted to a negative electrode, whereas he has a liquid kept organized by gravity. If he considers the implications of the temperatures that he's talking about, I think that all of his liquid will boil away. But his characterization of the dynamics of the topmost layer is spot on, as the extremely thin gas in the standard model would not support s-waves, granules, etc. That takes a liquid -- or a supercritical fluid.

3. Can liquid hydrogen plasma be positive, such as by being 90% neutral and 10% protons, or something like that?

As the pressure increases, the liquid becomes ionized. The degree of ionization depends on the pressure, so yes, it can be a little, or a lot.

4. He said gases can't boil and don't have distinct surfaces, so how can the photosphere be a gas plasma?

I'm saying that the hydrogen is highly compressed plasma, which has the dynamics of a liquid.

5. I read that the density of liquid hydrogen is .07 g/cm^3. I think that's at STP. Under pressure it reaches 1.4 g/cm^3 or so, I think you said. Any idea what the pressure would be at 4,800 km below TOP?

I haven't figured out how to calculate the pressures yet. It's clear that gravity is the smaller factor, while the electric force is what actually holds the tufts down to the cathode so forcefully. But I'm still working out how to set the degree of ionization accurately, depending on the pressure.

Do you have an idea what would produce the bright flickering pixels in the satellite images (which Michael interprets as small coronal loops on the subphotosphere solar moss layer, apparently because they have the same color as the coronal loops)?

In the running difference imagery, 1 pixel = 700 km, and 1 frame could be an hour or more. Granules are 1000 km wide, and play out in 20 minutes. So those could be granules coming & going, or shifting from one pixel to the next. We really need better resolution than just 1 pixel flashing on & off to make strong contentions.