The X-shaped structure at the center of the Milky Way. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech; D. Lang/Dunlap Institute.
Mar 14, 2018
The Milky Way is built from plasma.
NASA launched the Fermi Gamma-Ray Space Telescope on June 11, 2008. Its primary mission is observing high frequency electromagnetic waves in space, including gamma-rays. Gamma-rays are the most energetic of the three types of radioactivity, with values 10^15 times greater than visible light. They also have short wavelengths, less than 0.1 nanometers, in some instances. Since gamma-rays are unable to penetrate Earth’s atmosphere, Fermi was placed in high orbit.
A recent press release announced that Fermi detected several sources of gamma-ray emissions from the center of the Milky Way. Gamma-rays are theoretical particles called photons: “massless” force carriers known as bosons. However, since they travel at velocities that can exceed 2.993 x 10^10 centimeters per second, “relativistic effects” come into play. That velocity is thought to impart significant momentum to the photons, enough for them to have an impact on normal matter. Thus, gamma-rays are “ionizing radiation”, since they can knock electrons out of an atom.
Plasma is defined by charged particles: neon lights, lightning, planetary magnetospheres, stars, and galaxies are composed of various plasmas. It is important to remember that plasmas are a condition of matter. Although solid, liquid and gaseous states might prevail on Earth, plasma is another form of matter that exhibits unique properties.
Electricity can move through plasma in circuits. Electric circuits in space distinguishes Electric Universe theory from conventional viewpoints. Mysterious phenomena can be explained using observational evidence coupled with the results from laboratory experiments. That distinguishes Electric Universe concepts from others, since gravity cannot be examined in the laboratory.
Stars and galaxies are embedded in a circuit of electricity that flows through the Universe, so electromagnetism should be used as a basis for theories about their origins and evolution. For example, gamma rays extend axially beyond the Milky Way’s center, arising from an “X” shaped central structure. Each hourglass-shaped formation is about 65,000 light-years in diameter.
Lobes of radiation from the galactic core are clues to the formation of the X. The hourglass is a signature of Birkeland currents squeezing plasma and charged dust into z-pinch compression zones. Electric forces align those channels into filaments that attract each other. Electric fields generate a force that can be 39 orders of magnitude greater than gravity. However, when they get close to each other, 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.
Electric currents flow out along the galactic spin axis and form double layers that, as mentioned, can sometimes be seen as X-ray and gamma-ray lobes around active galaxies. The electric fields then spread out around the galaxy’s circumference, returning to the core along the spiral arms. Large-scale plasma discharges exhibit electrodynamic behavior. Gravity contributes to galaxies, but it is not the fundamental energy source.
Helical Birkeland currents, traveling through regions of high flux density, are forming the X in the center of the Milky Way. Concentrations of stars can identify Birkeland currents, so the circuits in the Milky Way are mapped-out by its glow discharges.
Stephen Smith
