IBEX discovers heliotail

[Sparky]

rkm, you may find this thread interesting: http://www.thunderbolts.info/forum/phpB ... 156#p78156

[seasmith]

TWO NOVEL PARAMETERS ... COMPLEXITY OF THE SUN'S MAGNETIC FIELD AND ... SOLAR CYCLE

Nearly 13 yr after the last solar maximum (~2000), the monthly sunspot number is currently only at half the highest value of the past cycle's maximum, whereas the polar magnetic field of the Sun is reversing (north pole first). These circumstances make it timely to consider alternatives to the sunspot number for tracking the Sun's magnetic cycle and measuring its complexity. In this study, we introduce two novel parameters, the standard deviation (SD) of the latitude of the heliospheric current sheet (HCS) and the integrated slope (SL) of the HCS, to evaluate the complexity of the Sun's magnetic field and track the solar cycle.

http://iopscience.iop.org/0004-637X/773/2/157/

.

In their recent paper titled Two Novel Parameters to Evaluate the Global Complexity of the Sun’s Magnetic Field and Track the Solar Cycle, researchers Liang Zhao, Enrico Landi and Sarah E. Gibson describe a fresh approach to model solar activity via looking at the 3-D dynamics heliospheric current sheET

The heliospheric current sheet (or HCS) is the boundary of the Sun’s magnetic field separating the northern and southern polarity regions which extends out into the solar system. During the solar minimum, the sheet is almost flat and skirt-like. But during solar maximum, it’s tilted, wavy and complex.

Two variables, known as SD & SL were used by researchers in the study to produce a measurement that can characterize the 3-D complexity of the HCS. “SD is the standard deviation of the latitudes of the HCS’s position on each of the Carrington maps of the solar surface, which basically tells us how far away the HCS is distributed from the equator. And SL is the integral of the slope of HCS on that map, which can tell us how wavy the HCS is on each of the map,” Liang Zhao told Universe Today.

The approximately 22 year span of time that it takes for the poles to reverse back to the same polarity again is equal to two average 11 year sunspot cycles. The Sun’s magnetic field has been exceptionally asymmetric during this cycle, and as of this writing, the Sun has already finished its reversal of the north pole first.

This sort of asymmetry during an imminent pole reversal was first recorded during solar cycle 19, which spanned 1954-1964. Solar cycles are numbered starting from observations which began in 1749, just four decades after the end of the 70-year Maunder Minimum.

http://www.universetoday.com/104023/is- ... lar-cycle/

[seasmith]

Journal reference: Science, DOI: 10.1126/science.1239925 IBEX follow up:

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn2 ... iogFeDAZpo

[seasmith]

supercomputer simulatios:

With help from Berkeley Lab visualization experts, astrophyscists found that as the turbulence evolves, it is actually creating waves that launch into the ambient plasma. (Image by Burlen Loring, Berkeley Lab)

Alfven ?

This LIC visualization of the magnetic field shows the hierarchical development of coherent structures in formation of current sheets and magnetic islands in fully developed turbulence. This level of detail is very difficult, if not impossible, to visualize using standard techniques of showing streamlines. Karimabadi and his colleagues are now using LIC routinely to search for development of complex structures.

http://cs.lbl.gov/news-media/news/2013/ ... olar-wind/

~~~An Alfven wave is like a wave travelling along a stretched string. The magnetic field line tension is analogous to string tension, and when the magnetic field is "plucked" by a perturbation, the disturbance propagates along the field line. At auroral altitudes, an Alfven wave typically has frequencies near a few Hertz. This corresponds to wavelengths reaching an Earth radius - this long-scale coherence, coupled with the notion that the wave is carried by ions and is capable of transporting significant energy in the form of Poynting flux towards the earth, indicates that Alfven waves may play a significant role in magnetosphere-ionosphere coupling.

http://ham.space.umn.edu/barbara/alfven.htm

[neilwilkes]

http://www.dartmouth.edu/~heliosphere/
This IS absolutely the picture of a comet, as well as the sun. The proof lies on page 103 of "The Electric Universe". If you see that image where x-rays are emitted where the positive solar wind particles hit the electrons in the coma, that matches what we see in the picture above. Again we need the termination shock (the equivalent of the coma) in that picture to be oppositely charged, in order to match the particle velocities shown. What this means in the electric comet model, is that yes, the comet's coma is oppositely charged to the sun, but also to the comets core. A comet's core must be charged the SAME as the sun.
One of the few successes of the mainstream's comet model, is the ability to accurately predict the return of a periodic comet. This can't be true in the electric model, if the cometary core is significantly more charged or neutral from one pass to the next. If, on the other hand, a core is charged like the sun, it will continually gain and lose it's electric coma. This is where Tom Van Flandern's genius is needed. The idea of spheres of influence is actually more important in the electric model, than it is in the gravitational model.

Cannot believe I have missed this thread before - ah, work always gets in the way.
The bit that just really made me sit up & take notice above (quoted out of context, with apologies) is Celeste's comment that one of the few successes of the mainstream cometary model is the prediction of returns but surely this is proof against the standard model? Bear with me, but surely if cometary tails are really created by shedding mass from the core/nucleus of the object then would it's gravitational attraction to the Sun not change after every approach, because according to mainstream they must - by definition - be getting lighter in terms of mass.....which would make any calculations go awry. Or am I allowing for too much loss each approach?

[Sparky]

What effect would the charge and gravity of Jupiter have on all of this?

Seems to me that the combined effects of the sun and Jupiter would create a wave that moves across the shock front.

[celeste]

http://www.dartmouth.edu/~heliosphere/
This IS absolutely the picture of a comet, as well as the sun. The proof lies on page 103 of "The Electric Universe". If you see that image where x-rays are emitted where the positive solar wind particles hit the electrons in the coma, that matches what we see in the picture above. Again we need the termination shock (the equivalent of the coma) in that picture to be oppositely charged, in order to match the particle velocities shown. What this means in the electric comet model, is that yes, the comet's coma is oppositely charged to the sun, but also to the comets core. A comet's core must be charged the SAME as the sun.
One of the few successes of the mainstream's comet model, is the ability to accurately predict the return of a periodic comet. This can't be true in the electric model, if the cometary core is significantly more charged or neutral from one pass to the next. If, on the other hand, a core is charged like the sun, it will continually gain and lose it's electric coma. This is where Tom Van Flandern's genius is needed. The idea of spheres of influence is actually more important in the electric model, than it is in the gravitational model.

Cannot believe I have missed this thread before - ah, work always gets in the way.
The bit that just really made me sit up & take notice above (quoted out of context, with apologies) is Celeste's comment that one of the few successes of the mainstream cometary model is the prediction of returns but surely this is proof against the standard model? Bear with me, but surely if cometary tails are really created by shedding mass from the core/nucleus of the object then would it's gravitational attraction to the Sun not change after every approach, because according to mainstream they must - by definition - be getting lighter in terms of mass.....which would make any calculations go awry. Or am I allowing for too much loss each approach?

Actually, if a comet loses mass,gravitational forces decrease, but so does inertia. So we are left with the same orbit. What we can't have, is changing electrostatic forces influencing an orbit, unless somehow we had an exactly corresponding change in inertial mass. That's not likely.
When I wrote that post, I was unaware of Donald Scott's filament model. It changes everything.
It turns out that gravity and magnetism can explain stable orbits, without electrostatic forces playing a role. That was so counterintuitive to me, with the success of Wal's electric comet model, how could electrostatic forces not play a role in comet orbits? The fact that comets do show signs of sudden discharge,without a significant change in orbit, should have been my clue all along. Obviously the sudden discharge is not accompanied by a proportional loss of inertial mass from the comet.

[seasmith]

∞
Sorry about the confusion with that 2010 IBEX thread.
Here's the IBEX update:

LSM: SIX YEARS OF DIRECT SAMPLING BY IBEX

This paper ties together the 14 studies in this Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series Special Issue, which collectively describe the IBEX interstellar
...
Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series Special Issue ...

http://iopscience.iop.org.sci-hub.io/ar ... /2/22/meta



List of additional articles:
http://iopscience.iop.org/0067-0049/pag ... 0on%20IBEX

[seasmith]

Sun's Magnetic Shield May Be a Bubble, Not Comet-Shaped

The new work combines data from NASA's Cassini mission, which is currently orbiting Saturn, with observations from the agency's Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX), which detects particles that bounce back from the heliosphere's edge from an eccentric orbit above Earth. The researchers also incorporated data from the Voyager 1 spacecraft — the first and only human-made object to travel into interstellar space — and Voyager 2, which is on its way to being the second. Both spacecraft have already ventured into the heliosheath, the region near the heliosphere's outer edge where the solar wind is slowed and buffeted as it runs into the interstellar medium.

The sun's heliosphere, which is its bubble of magnetic influence that extends out far past Neptune and Pluto, may be rounded rather than extended like a comet's tail, new research suggests. Here, the new view of the heliosphere, supported by new observations, is modeled next to the older view of the heliosphere extending out behind the solar system as the sun travels through interstellar space.
Credit: Dialynas, et al. (left); NASA (right)
The sun's magnetic "sphere of influence" that surrounds our solar system is shaped like a bubble, rather than having a long, comet-like tail as many scientists previously thought, new observations suggest.



Though previous work had suggested that a comet-like tail stretched out behind the solar system as it moved through interstellar space, the new work shows that the heliosphere might instead be rounded on both ends, whipped back into shape by the interstellar magnetic field. The study covers an entire 11-year solar activity cycle, when the sun's number of sunspots and solar storms increases and decreases, which impacts the strength of its solar wind. [How the Sun's Magnetic Field Works (Infographic)]


"Instead of a prolonged, comet-like tail, this rough bubble shape of the heliosphere is due to the strong interstellar magnetic field — much stronger than was anticipated in the past — combined with the fact that the ratio between particle pressure and magnetic pressure inside the [heliosphere's outer region, called the] heliosheath is high," Kostas Dialynas, a space scientist at the Academy of Athens in Greece and lead author of the study, said in the statement.
...

http://www.space.com/36595-sun-magnetic ... comet.html

[Robertus Maximus]

I have mentioned the findings from the latest study here, under the title 'The Heliotail does not exist!': viewtopic.php?f=3&t=16299&start=135#p119269