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Comets: Deep Impact
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Missing water
Thornhill: An abundance of water on or below the surface of
the nucleus (the underlying assumption of the "dirty snowball"
hypothesis) is unlikely.
see [
2005 July 03]
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Result
The explosion removed many thousands of tons of material.
But prior to impact, the calculated "water" output
was 550 pounds per second; and not long after the impact, the
calculated output was, once again, 550 pounds per second (See
picture above regarding the return to previous level). So despite
the impressive explosion, the envisioned sub-surface water
refused to reveal itself. By NASA's own calculations, therefore,
Deep Impact has only made matters worse for standard theory.
see [
2005 July 16]
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Comet breakup
Thornhill: So there is some small chance that astronomers will
be surprised to see the comet split apart, if the projectile
reaches the surface of the comet and results in an intense
arc.
see [
2001 Oct 18]
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Result
Thornhill: These predictions remain but the intensity of
the electrical effects depend upon the degree to which the
comet is charged with respect to the solar plasma at the impact
point. So it is disappointing that NASA chose a short period
comet that only ranges between the orbits of Jupiter and Mars.
Long period comets spend more time travelling slowly in the
lower voltage regions of the outer solar system. So when they
rush toward the Sun their electrical display is more energetic
than the short period comets. Also, the same electrical circuit
that drives the Sun energizes comets. The Sun’s activity is
near minimum, so we may expect reduced cometary activity. Of
course, none of these electrical considerations figured in
NASA’s thinking.
see [
2005 July 03]
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Advance flash
Thornhill: Electrical interactions with Deep Impact may be slight,
but they should be measurable if NASA will look for them. They
would likely be similar to those of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9
prior to striking Jupiter's atmosphere: The most obvious would
be a flash (lightning-like discharge) shortly before impact.
see [
2005 July 03]
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Result
What you see is something really surprising. First, there
is a small flash, then there's a delay, then there's a big
flash and the whole thing breaks loose.
see [
2005 July 07]
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Energy release
Thornhill:The electrical energy will be released before impact.
see [
2005 July 03]
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Result
See previous observation.
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Sheath around impactor
Thornhill: The impactor may form a sheath around it as it enters
the coma, becoming a "comet within a comet". The
plasma sheath could interfere with communications in the same
way as experienced by the Space Shuttle during reentry.
see [
2005 July 03]
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Result
Finally, why were there no images returned from the impactor
seconds before impact? The lower right image is the last from
the impactor camera. Thornhill predicted an electrical flash
before impact. Yesterday's TPOD reported the surprise expressed
by NASA's expert on high-velocity impacts, Peter Schultz, when
two flashes were seen. The lack of images in the last few seconds
would be explained simply if the impactor was hit by a "cometary
lightning bolt" seconds before contact. The "whiteout"
seen in the lower right quadrant indicates significant electrical
discharging near the impact point. Data from the communications
team and the flyby spacecraft cameras should decide the issue.
see [
2005 July 08]
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System failure
Thornhill: Internal electrical stress may short out the electronics
on board the impactor before impact. That could compromise
the guidance system and the success of the mission.
see [
2005 July 03]
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Result
See previous observation.
see [
2005 July 08]
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High-energy explosion
Thornhill: The energetic effects of the encounter should exceed
that of a simple physical impact, in the same way that was
seen with comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 at Jupiter.
see [
2001 Oct 18]
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Result
It is now well documented that every scientist associated
with the project was stunned by the energetic outburst.
see [
2005 July 07]
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Multiple craters
Thornhill: If the energy is distributed over several flashes,
more than one crater on the comet nucleus could result - in
addition to any impact crater.
see [
2005 July 03]
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Result
By tracing rays back to their source we noted the appearance
of two ejecta centers immediately after the impact.
see [
2005 July 19]
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Water in coma
Thornhill: It is advisable that investigators look at water
abundances both close to the nucleus and in the far coma to
see to what extent water is being formed away from the nucleus
by the combination of negative oxygen ions with protons from
the solar wind. The logical concern here is that these reactions
will, by improper reasoning, give inflated values for the water
ice abundance in the comet nucleus.
see [
2005 July 03]
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Result
Readings of the relative abundance of OH should drop in
the immediate wake of impact, while in the days after the impact
abundances of OH should rise. Though this is inconceivable
under the standard model, preliminary data released does suggest
this pattern.
see [
2005 July 19]
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Fine dust
Thornhill: The primary distinction between a comet and an asteroid
is that, due to its elliptical orbit, electrical arcing and
"electrostatic cleaning" will clean the nucleus'
surface, leaving little or no dust or debris on it.
see [
2005 July 03]
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Result
Both the volume of dust and its extraordinarily fine texture
have created mysteries for cometologists. The ejected dust
appears to be as fine as talcum powder. In no sense was this
expected. But it is characteristic of "cathode sputtering",
a process used industrially to create super-fine deposits or
coatings from cathode materials.
see [
2006 Febrary 17]
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Surface geology
Thornhill: The model predicts a sculpted surface, distinguished
by sharply defined craters, valleys, mesas, and ridges - the
opposite of the softened relief expected of a sublimating "dirty
snowball". (A chunk of ice melting in the Sun loses its
sharp relief, just like a scoop of melting ice cream.)
see [
2005 July 03]
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Result
...makes an observation in a NASA release on Deep Impact
all the more noteworthy: "The image [of the nucleus] reveals
topographic features, including ridges, scalloped edges and
possibly impact craters formed long ago".
see [
2005 July 08]
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Possible new jet
Thornhill: The discharge and/or impact may initiate a new jet
on the nucleus (which will be collimated - filamentary - not
sprayed out) and could even abruptly change the positions and
intensities of other jets due to the sudden change in charge
distribution of the comet nucleus.
see [
2005 July 03]
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Result
An El Roque de los Muchachos observatory (La Palma, Spain)
report states, "New jets appeared after the impact, the
two jets observed in the previous night are still active. Also
the curved expanding impact dust shell is visible at ~18 arcsec
(corresponding to about 12,000km) from the comet nucleus".
see [
2006 March 03]
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Surface arcing
Thornhill: A mechanical impact will not produce the temperatures
of an electric arc, which can be tens of thousands of degrees
over a very small area. The problem will be whether temperature
readings will have the resolution to be able to distinguish
a very high temperature over a tiny area or merely an average
over a large impact area. Anomalous high temperature readings
could precede physical impact, accompany impact, and follow
impact. An indicator of arcing would be the presence of atoms
ionised to a higher degree than can be explained by the energy
of the impact.
see [
2005 July 03]
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Result
We had seen very small white spots on photographs of comet
Wild 2, and interpreted them as electrical arcs in the form
of coronal discharges. The highest resolution photographs of
Tempel 1, taken by the impactor, show numerous featureless
patches of white-out, most located where the electrical hypothesis
would put them - on the rims of craters and on the wall of
cliffs rising above flat valley floors. This single feature,
we believe, provides the "smoking guns" we have waited
for. Since their initial suggestion that the patches could
be highly reflective spots on the surface, we've heard no further
comment on the subject. The signature of electric arcing should
be clearly evident in the full stream of data now being analyzed.
see [
2005 July 19]
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Subsurface composition
Thornhill: The impact/electrical discharge will not reveal "primordial
dirty ice", but the same composition as the surface.
see [
2005 July 03]
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Result
In fact there was no change in measured water after the
impact. Another observation from the Odin telescope in Sweden
found that the total amount of water appeared to decrease after
the impact, probably because of the injection of quantities
of dry dust.
see [
2005 July 15]
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Comets: Stardust
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Subsurface composition
Thornhill: Comets are the result of electrical discharge machining
of planetary bodies that occurs in the catastrophic evolution
of planetary orbits. It is far too simplistic to assume that
the planets were formed along with the Sun and remained in
their present orbits ever since.
see [
2004 January 06]
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Result
NASA researchers announced on March 13 another in the long
procession of surprises about comets. The grains from comet
Wild 2, trapped in aerogel and returned to Earth, were much
larger than expected and made from the same high-temperature
minerals as found in the most abundant meteorites. This discovery
was so unexpected that an early sample was thought to be contamination
from the spacecraft.
see [
2006 March 14]
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Comet origins
Thornhill: Plasma cosmologists have shown that stars do not
form by gravitational accretion. Stars form in a cosmic discharge,
inside a plasma z-pinch. The dusty disks seen about some stars
may not be due to gravitational accretion but are more likely
to be matter expelled electrically by the central star. Electrical
expulsion can also explain the formation of the observed close
orbiting gas giants. In a hierarchical fashion, comets can
be seen as the debris, or afterbirth, of a planet. They are
not primordial.
see [
2008 January 25]
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Result
Hope Ishii of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
(LLNL) in Livermore, California, US told the New Scientist:
“Wild 2 should still be considered a comet, because it is throwing
off gas and dust as ice on its surface evaporates in sunlight.
This is a good indication that there is a continuum between
asteroids and comets." This bolsters the view that there
is no sharp dividing line between comets and asteroids.
see [
2008 Jan 25]
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Sun
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Shape of heliosphere
Thornhill: The expectations of NASA scientists are not being
met because their shock front model is incorrect. The boundary
that Voyager has reached is more complex and structured than
a mechanical impact.”
see [
2006 Sept 29]
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Result
Voyagers 1 and 2 reached the boundary of the Sun’s influence
in 2005 and 2007, respectively, taking point measurements as
they left the solar system. Before IBEX, there was only data
from these two points at the edge of the solar system. While
exciting and valuable, the data they provided about this region
raised more questions than they resolved. IBEX has filled in
the entire interaction region, revealing surprising details
completely unpredicted by any theories.
see [
2009 Oct 20]
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Mars
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Dust devils at heart of dust storm
The global dust storm that engulfed the planet Mars in August
and September of 2001, involved a packed assembly of "dust
devils" carrying great volumes of Martian dust into billowing
clouds.
see [
2005 Nov 09]
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Result
The image above, released December 30, 2003, shows apparent
vortices (a word that would not be used by NASA scientists)
rising into billowing clouds from the margins of the south
polar ice cap in the Martian summer. The caption accompanying
the release, reads: "Like billowing smoke from a brush
fire, clouds of dust are seen streaming off the edge of the
Martian south polar cap. The southern hemisphere is in the
middle of its summer season and experiencing a multitude of
small dust storms like this one. The net effect is an increasingly
dusty atmosphere across the whole planet and with it, warmer
atmospheric temperatures."
see [
2007 May 9]
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Topography ignored
When viewed more closely it will be seen that the channels do
not follow topography in the fashion of flowing liquid.
see [
2007 May 14]
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Result
A recent HiRise close-up image of a crater appears to confirm
this. This will be clarified in a future TPOD.
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Proximity to electrostatic sculpting
Since the channels are carved into a smooth surface (i.e., a
surface not strewn with boulders and rocky rubble), the immediate
surroundings should have preserved more subtle evidence of
particle beam activity, electrostatic sculpting, and glassification.
see [
2007 May 14]
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Result
The shiny appearance of the ravines is at least consistent
with the possibility of glassification, though far from definitive.
Further investigation is pending.
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Terminal craters
Cratering in connection with channel formation must be anticipated,
particularly at the starting points and terminations of the
channels.
see [
2007 May 14]
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Result
Recent HiRise images confirm the prediction of craters strategically
placed along the ravines, particularly at the terminations.
This will be discussed in a future TPOD.
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Saturn
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Both poles hot
Thornhill: The Electric Universe also predicts, experimentum
crucis, that BOTH poles should be hot, not one hot and
the other cold.
see [
2005 February 5]
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Result
Saturn's chilly north pole boasts a hot spot of compressed
air, a surprising discovery that could shed light on other
planets within our own solar system and beyond, researchers
said on Thursday. Scientists already knew about a hot spot
at Saturn's sunny south pole but data from the Cassini spacecraft
now shows that the winter pole drenched in darkness also has
a hot spot, said Nick Teanby, a planetary scientist, who worked
on the study. With this Cassini mission we can also see the
winter pole, which we are not able to see from Earth because
of the tilt of the planet, said Teanby of the University of
Oxford. "We didn't expect it to have a hot spot at the
north." The hot spot is essentially a small, narrow region
hotter than the gas surrounding it, the international team
reported in the journal Science.
see [
2008 January 3]
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Saturn's moons
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Moving geysers
Regarding Enceladus, electrical theorist Wallace Thornhill and
his colleagues suggest there is no geyser of subsurface water
analogous to the Yellowstone geyser. They say that if NASA
will look they will find that the jets 'move across the surface'.
And in their motion across the surface, the electric arcs that
produce the jets are 'creating' the observed channels as they
excavate material from the surface and accelerate it into space.
see [
2006 Mar 13]
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Result
It turns out that NASA has had sufficient data in hand for
at least several months confirming that the jets do indeed
move across the surface (see for example [
this
video], in which the jets move in opposition to the visual
rotation of the sphere).
see [
2006 Nov 8]
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Crater Free
Thornhill: We should expect to see family traits amongst the
members of the Saturnian family — including the departed Earth,
Mars and Venus. For example, the moon Titan, which is larger
than the planet Mercury, seems to be a close sibling of Venus,
probably born from Saturn at about the same time. That Titan
may be young is hinted at by its eccentric orbit, which cannot
have persisted for billions of years. So we should be alert
to similarities between Titan and Venus.
see [
2004 Jun 19]
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Result
"The images show a landscape that is clearly still
being shaped... its surface today is largely crater-free."
That is precisely what was said about Venus when the Magellan
Orbiter revealed that planet's surface. However, like Venus,
there may have been no impact craters to fill.
see [
2004 Nov 25]
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Uniform temperatures
see previous prediction
see [
2004 Jun 19]
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Result
Like Venus, surface temperatures are globally uniform on
Titan within a few degrees. It is thought that there is a greenhouse
effect operating on Titan. However, the heat of Venus is due
to its origin and has nothing to do with a greenhouse effect.
The same will likely be true for Titan.
see [
2004 Nov 25]
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Magnetotail
see previous prediction
see [
2004 Jun 19]
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Result
Like Venus, Titan seems not to have a magnetic field and
yet it has a distinct magnetotail.
see [
2004 Nov 25]
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Pancake Domes
see previous prediction
see [
2004 Jun 19]
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Result
One large circular feature, suspected of being a crater
until closer examination showed it to be flat, closely resembles
the pancake domes seen on Venus that are produced by magma
welling up to produce a bubble that then slumps down to a nearly
flat profile.
see [
2004 Nov 25]
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UV Shining
see previous prediction
see [
2004 Jun 19]
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Result
Titan's electrical plasma interactions may be like those
of Venus. Titan shines on the dayside in UV light too brightly
to be explained by solar radiation.
see [
2004 Jun 19]
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No hydrocarbon oceans
see previous prediction
see [
2004 Jun 19]
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Result
However, radar, infrared and radio observations of Titan
have not found signs of a hydrocarbon ocean. In fact one radar
return was "of a type that we would expect to get back
from Venus".
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Io
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Hot plumes
Thornhill: I predict that when seen close up the temperature
of those hot spots will approach that of the Sun as they are
both electric arcs. (Electric arcs create intensely hot spots.)
see [
1999 Oct 8]
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Result
The spacecraft measured the temperatures of Io's "volcanic"
hot spots and gave readings, averaged over a pixel, that were
hotter than any lava on Earth - in fact, too hot to be measured
by Galileo's instruments.
see [
2004 Dec 15]
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Channel shapes
Thornhill: On the contrary, most of the dark patterns seen radiating
from the crater in this image of the Marduk "volcano"
are not lava flows. They have the shape of lightning scars
on Earth and are caused by powerful currents streaking across
the surface to satisfy the arc's hunger for electric charge.
They rip huge sinuous furrows in the soil and hurl it to either
side to form levee banks and side lobes. The stubby side channels
will be found to have rounded ends like those seen on Martian
"rivers".
see [
1999 Oct 8]
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Result
The best resource for this is the closeups of Io's "volcanoes"
that show the stubby, round-ended channels. One of the clearest
is PIA02545 where you see the scalloped channels off to the
right of the so-called "caldera."
see [
2000 May 18]
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Moving plumes
The plumes are the jets of cathode arcs, and they do not explode
from a volcanic vent but move around and erode the periphery
of dark areas (called "lava lakes" by planetary geologists)
see [
2004 Dec 15]
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Result
None of the expected volcanic vents could be found. Rather,
the plumes of the "volcanoes" are actually moving
across the surface of Io, an exclamation point being provided
by the plume of Prometheus which, in the years since Voyager,
has moved more than 80 kilometers.
see [
2004 Dec 15]
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Cool "lava lakes"
Thornhill: The "lava lakes" themselves are merely
the solid surface of Io etched electrically by cathode arcs
and exposed from beneath the sulfur dioxide "snow"
deposited by continuous discharge activity. Therefore, they
will not reveal the expected heat of a recent lava flow.
see [
2004 Dec 15]
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Result
As predicted by Thornhill, the discharging was discovered
to be focused on the edges of the so-called "lava lakes",
though the rest of these dark fields are comparatively cold.
see [
2004 Dec 15]
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Supernovae: SN1987A
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Structure of equatorial rings
Thornhill: If the equatorial ring shows the Birkeland currents
in the outer sheath of an axial plasma current column, then
the supernova outburst is the result of a cosmic z-pinch in
the central column, focused on the central star. It is important
to note that the z-pinch naturally takes the ubiquitous hourglass
shape of planetary nebulae. No special conditions and mysteriously
conjured magnetic fields are required.
see [
2005 August 24]
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Result
The Red Square shows the stellar Z-pinch in close-up and
we can see the Birkeland filaments for the first time, called
'combs' in the Science paper. They match the electrical model.
Supernova 1987A was successfully decoded.
see [
2007 April 17]
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Fusion
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Tokamak reactor
Stephen Smith: Astronomers have infected physicists with the
"hot gas" theory, causing a 50 year failed experiment
with nuclear fusion. Squeezing hot gas into a volume small
enough for fusion to take place has not worked and we predict
that it will never work. The theory of star formation through
fusion reactions is untenable so utilizing the theories of
plasma behavior might be a more productive path.
see [
2007 November 02]
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Result
Still waiting for a success story from the Tokamak project.
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