Edge-on galaxy NGC 4710. Credit: NASA and ESA.
 

Criss Cross Bulge
Jun 27, 2011

Any substance containing charged particles is a plasma: electrons, positive ions, electrically charged dust, neon lights, lightning, planetary magnetospheres, the so-called "solar wind," stars, and even galaxies are plasma.

Filaments of electric current can flow in closed circuits through plasma. It is the existence of electric circuits in space that distinguishes Electric Universe theory from most conventional viewpoints. Phenomena that appear "mysterious" to space scientists are readily explained using observational evidence coupled with the results from laboratory experiments. That fact helps to distinguish Electric Universe concepts from others. Gravity cannot be modeled in the laboratory in the ways that plasma can.

X-ray emissions from planets, braided plasma filaments, hourglass-shaped nebulae, and jets of charged particles erupting from galactic axes provide observational evidence for the existence of plasma circuits in space. Celestial bodies are not isolated from one another but are connected across vast distances.

Electric discharges in plasma create tube-like magnetic sheaths along their axes. If enough current flows, the discharge causes the sheath to glow while sometimes creating other sheaths within it. These "double layers" form when positive charges build up in one region and negative charges build up nearby. An intense electric field develops, which accelerates charged particles. Electric charges spiral in the magnetic fields, emitting X-rays, extreme ultraviolet, and sometimes gamma rays.

Electromagnetic forces squeeze those conductive channels, called "Birkeland currents," into filaments that tend to attract each other in pairs. Electric fields that form along the plasma strands generate an attractive force that can be 39 orders of magnitude greater than gravity. However, when they get close to each other, instead of merging, the plasma "cables" twist into a helix that rotates faster as it compresses tighter. It is those "cosmic transmission lines" that make up galactic circuits.

The cosmos appears to be interlaced with those interacting circuits. Each of those circuits appears to be composed of untold numbers of twisting Birkeland currents. At the largest observable scale, there are power-consuming loads in the circuits that convert electrical energy into rotational energy. These are known as galaxies.

Since galaxies exist within a filamentary circuit of electricity that flows through the cosmos, they should be evaluated according to electrodynamic principles and not on mechanical kinetic behavior with mysterious magnetic fields added to save the theory.

For example, twin lobes of gamma rays in an hourglass shape extend axially beyond the Milky Way's central bulge. Each structure measures approximately 65,000 light-years in diameter.

Plasma physicists are familiar with hourglass shapes. The funicular formations are an unmistakable signature of Birkeland currents squeezing plasma and charged dust into z-pinch compression zones. The intense magnetic fields associated with Birkeland current filaments cause electrons to accelerate with velocities close to light speed. Those excited electrons emit synchrotron radiation, the principle source for gamma rays in space.

Electric Universe advocates have long known that radio lobes far above the poles of active galaxies are the signature of Birkeland currents. In the case of NGC 4710, partial field aligned ring currents can be seen extending out from the galaxy's core.

According to astronomers, NGC 4710's central "X" is mysterious, and could be due to the vertical motion of stars around its nucleus. They do not know why the stars are consolidated into symmetrical rings. However, the structure is another example of energized plasma. Looking for answers in gravitational theory will not help to resolve its enigmatic form.

Stephen Smith