The New Solar Cycle
Jun 03, 2009

"Thermonuclear fusion powers the Sun." The phrase is no longer spoken with any implied question, it is explicitly stated as fact by conventional astrophysicists from every university or research institute. The commonly accepted nuclear power source for the Sun is due to core temperatures high enough for hydrogen ions to combine into helium nuclei and excess energy, according to theory. The Sun then radiates that energy into space in the form of x-rays, as well as visible and extreme ultraviolet light. Heavier ionized atomic nuclei are also emitted, forming the solar wind.

However, a growing number of independent scientists, engineers, and researchers insist that the popular theory is wrong. They say that the Sun is an electrical phenomenon and not strictly fed by nuclear fusion; it is a localized glow discharge through plasma and is fed by electric currents flowing through the galaxy.

According to the electrical model of stars, the Sun acts like the “anode” or positively charged electrode in a circuit, while the "cathode" or negatively charged electrode is not an object, but is “virtual” and located far beyond the planetary orbits. The virtual cathode is known as the “heliopause”: in electrical terms, it is a double layer separating the plasma that surrounds the Sun from the galactic plasma in which the Solar System is immersed.

Sunspots are not a well understood phenomenon from the fusion stand point. It is known that magnetism is involved with sunspot activity, because gigantic loops and whorls of plasma can often be seen connecting two or more of them, held in place by the spiraling magnetic fields. Why or how that magnetism is at work on the Sun remains unclear in consensus opinions. Filaments and "fibrils" can be detected with high resolution photographic equipment in the penumbra, or darkened cores of sunspots. The swirling plasma spirals look more like electromagnetic tornadoes than anything else.

This is one example where understanding the difference between hot gas (which does not contain charged particles) and plasma (which does contain charged particles and can be electrically active) could provide some illumination: sunspots are not the result of gas convection modified by magnetism, sunspots are electrical structures.

For conventional theory, sunspot penumbrae remain a mystery: the standard solar model does not predict such structures. The electric model does predict them. Electric discharges often appear as long twisting filaments. Because they are funnels of glowing plasma they appear darker in their centers—convection cells would appear darker on their cooler edges.

In the electrical model the sunspot cycle is most likely a result of fluctuations in the electrical power supply from the local arm of our galaxy. As the varying current density and magnetic fields of huge Birkeland current filaments slowly rotate past our solar system, they apply more or less power to the electrical circuit that lights up our daytime sky. Rather than a weak Sun, the lack of sunspots here at the beginning of Solar Cycle 24 is most likely due to a weaker current flow through the galaxy.

Stephen Smith