Comets and Galaxies

The Comet Galaxy (upper left) in galaxy cluster Abell 2667. Credit: NASA, ESA, Jean-Paul Kneib (Laboratoire d'Astrophysique de Marseille)

The Comet Galaxy (upper left) in galaxy cluster Abell 2667. Credit: NASA, ESA, Jean-Paul Kneib (Laboratoire d’Astrophysique de Marseille)

 

Jan 02, 2014

Galactic tails, bright comas, and central nuclei are reminiscent of comets.

What is a comet? Most astronomers think comets are small, fragile, irregularly shaped objects composed mostly of water ice and dust, along with carbon and silicon-based compounds. “Dirty snowballs,” as Fred Whipple described them in 1950. Consensus opinions continue to support the theory after almost 60 years.

According to Whipple’s proposal, when a comet approaches the Sun, the “hot” solar wind transforms its solid nuclei directly into a vapor through sublimation, bypassing the liquid phase. Material begins to expand outward, forming a cloud of gas and dust otherwise known as the coma. Sunlight and the solar wind interact with the cloud to form a long tail.

However, Electric Universe advocates see them differently.

Comets spend most of their time far from the Sun where the charge density is low. Since comets move slowly, their electric charges reach equilibrium with the weak, radial solar electric field. When a comet falls in to the inner Solar System closer to the Sun, however, its nucleus accelerates into regions of increasing charge density and voltage.

Charge polarization in the nucleus respond to the increasing electrical stress, forming a vast coma (plasma sheath) around the comet. Discharge jets flare up and move across the surface, similar to the plumes on Jupiter’s moon, Io. If the internal electrical stress becomes too great, the nucleus may explode like an overcharged capacitor, breaking into fragments or vanishing forever. Similar effects are most likely responsible for meteoric explosions in Earth’s atmosphere, such as the one that occurred over Tunguska in Siberia.

Surprisingly, an image from the Hubble Space Telescope highlights an “odd-looking spiral galaxy” moving at 3.5 million kilometers per hour through Abell 2667. Its high velocity is primarily attributed to the gravitational forces exerted by dark matter, hot gas, and other galaxies in the cluster.

“This unique galaxy, situated 3.2 billion light-years from Earth, has an extended stream of bright blue knots and diffuse wisps of young stars driven away by the tidal forces and the ‘ram pressure stripping’ of the hot dense gas.”

In past Picture of the Day articles, shock waves, hot gas, and collisions in deep space are not considered appropriate explanations when discussing high-energy electromagnetic radiation in the cosmos. From gamma rays down through X-rays and extreme ultraviolet, conventional theories rely upon gravitational acceleration, explosions and collisions as the only way for them to be produced in space.

The conventional story of gas being stripped from this galaxy by ram pressure and stars being torn from it by the gravity of the galactic cluster has no place in an Electric Universe. The gas and stars are subject to more powerful electromagnetic influences both external and internal to the galaxy. The conventional mechanical comet model is as inappropriate for the “Comet Galaxy” as it is for comets in our solar system.

Electrical connections exist throughout the Universe. From the smallest scale atomic interactions to the largest scale cosmic conglomerations, electricity provides the power and demonstrates its activity in plain sight.

Stephen Smith and Wal Thornhill

Click here for a Spanish translation

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