<blockquote>'The discovery that space was permeated with cells and filaments of plasma overturned the “empty space” cornerstone assumption. The discovery that electromagnetic forces in plasma could be many times stronger than gravity fractured the “gravity-only” cornerstone. The discovery that Birkeland-current filaments could connect cosmic bodies into hierarchies of coupled circuits threatened to replace the “internally powered” cornerstone with an “externally powered” one. Only theorists’ dogmatic adherence to the obsolete assumptions preserves them.'
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Two Views of a Supernova, Aug 25, 2009
'When NASA studied dust devils in the Arizona desert in order to understand more about the ones that have been seen on Mars, they found an electric field of up to 10,000 volts per meter associated with dust devils on Earth. The normal fair weather electric field at the Earth's surface measures 100 volts per meter. This suggests that dust devils on both Earth and Mars are atmospheric electric discharge phenomena similar to the electric breezes produced by "ionic wind" air purifiers.'
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Mars Lights and Lightning, Aug 24, 2009
'Since its serendipitous discovery in 1983, the Leo Ring has presented a number of problems for the conventional model of galaxy formation.
The Leo Ring is about 35 million light-years away, 620,000 light-years wide, and is apparently orbiting a pair of galaxies in the Leo Group, M105 and NGC 3384. It is fairly evenly spread but exhibits some clumpiness as shown in the figure above. The Ring has been mapped most thoroughly in its southern portions close to the bright M96 galaxy (bottom right of the picture above).
The Leo Ring is clear evidence of extensive intergalactic matter, which in itself is relatively controversial. Additionally, it is intergalactic matter which in its clumpier regions approaches densities equivalent to interstellar matter within galaxies. This is highly unusual indeed and indicates there is likely more of this type of intergalactic matter if we look for it correctly.
In the numerous journal articles written about this structure (mostly contributed by Stephen Schneider, who discovered the Leo Ring), there has evolved an accepted view that the Leo Ring is composed of “pristine” gas from the early days of the Universe after the Big Bang. This assumption derives from an as yet untested hypothesis that the matter comprising the Leo Ring is low in metallicity (elements heavier than hydrogen or helium).
Observations over the years have revealed no star formation in the Leo Ring, except for a small, very dim dwarf galaxy (Leo Dwarf A). However, a recent study (Thilker et al., 2009) observed the Leo Ring in ultraviolet light (UV) using the NASA Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX). The investigators detected UV emissions within distinct substructures in the Leo Ring, indicating recent star formation. However, the star formation appears to be confined to small dim dwarf galaxies. The confusing part for the investigators is that such dwarf galaxies (often observed as satellite galaxies around larger galaxies) are usually dominated by dark matter. In this case, there is no evidence for dark matter.
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The Electric Universe model would take a different view of the Leo Ring and the newly discovered dwarf galaxy formation: The “gas” in the Leo Ring is actually plasma, though in dark mode with very low current density. The plasma is not “primordial” and could of a similar metallicity as other interstellar matter, unless Marklund Convection has "sorted" it into relatively pure hydrogen and helium.
The Leo Ring plasma is under very low electrical stress, resulting in very low rotational velocity for the dwarf galaxies (e.g. the Leo Dwarf A has a rotational velocity less than one tenth of the much brighter M105 galaxy).
The low electrical stress also produces low rates of star formation and a notable lack of X-ray emission. The Leo Ring plasma might have organized over billions of years through mostly electromagnetic forces, possibly through weak magnetic fields permeating the unusually closely packed cluster of galaxies in the Leo Group.
The study by Thilker et al. has prompted discussions about different types of galaxies, some with dark matter and others without dark matter. However, a different view is that there are galaxies under more or less electrical stress. Those under higher electrical stress will exhibit higher rotational velocities than can be explained with gravity alone.
Interestingly, those galaxies under higher electrical stress will show brighter X-ray sources in the region outside of the visible matter in the galactic ring. Note that X-ray emissions in outer galactic rings (where rotational velocities are higher than gravity can support) tend to be used for dark matter computations.
The dark matter model will not die easily though. As Thilker says, “I think the bulk of evidence from previous studies still strongly supports the role of dark matter in shaping the well-known galaxy population.”
Understand the logic here. Thilker has just reported on galaxy formation completely contradicting the dark matter halo model and yet concedes his findings do not really impact the conventional wisdom about dark matter. One wonders where the clear thinkers and scientific rebels have disappeared to in the astronomy community. Let us hope there are more Halton Arps out there somewhere.'
- Tom Wilson,
The Leo Ring, Sep 17, 2009</blockquote>