MeerKAT Releases Epic Image of the Galactic Center

originally posted by: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

Magnetic, gravitic, quantum effects, so, hey, why not electricity!

For all intensive purposes those two are the same thing.

I think the counter point to Electric Universe I'd call it the Chemical Universe. Although the first chapter of both Basic Chemistry and Basic Electricity are essentially the same content. It takes two to tango as they say. Then again a vacuum is a complete lack of chemistry (which electromagnetism can travel through regardless), and light. Light is part of the electromagnetic spectrum. And it can travel through a vacuum as a result. Yet the universe is more empty than full of chemistry I surmise. Is it more empty than full of electromagnetic waves, or anything else I could only guess. Not my field of heavy interest.

To get to the nitty gritty of which it is I'd beg the question can electromagnetism exist without chemistry to generate it?

If it cant then I'd goo with the Chemical Universe.

originally posted by: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

Credit: SARAO

You’re looking at the center of our galactic home, the Milky Way, as imaged by 64 radio telescopes in the South African wilderness.

Scientists released this image today to inaugurate the completed MeerKAT radio telescope. But these scopes form part of an even more ambitious project: the Square Kilometer Array, a joint effort to build the world’s largest telescope, spanning the continents of Africa and Australia.

This image shows filaments of particles, structures that seem to exist in alignment with the galaxy’s central black hole. It’s unclear what causes these filaments. Maybe they are particles ejected by the spinning black hole; maybe they are hypothesized “cosmic strings;” and maybe they’re not unique, and there are other, similar structures waiting to be found, according to a 2017 release from Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.

“This image from MeerKAT is awesome to me because the fine filaments seen in the radio image are excellent tracers of the galactic magnetic field, something we don’t get to see in most optical and infrared data,” Erin Ryan, principal investigator at the SETI Institute, told Gizmodo.

Gizmodo.com - New South African Telescope Releases Epic Image of the Galactic Center.

Happy Friday the Thirteenth ATS! To help celebrate your triskaidekaphobia the good folk manning the meerKAT radio telescope in South Africa have published a photo of the supermassive black hole at the center of our own Milky Way. You can go to gizmodo to see the full picture (~9 MB) as the one seen here is a dithered version of the same.

Last year (??), meerKAT took a photo of blank patch of space and found hundreds of galaxies there. That was with only 16 of the telescopes up and running. In May, 2018, they had all 64 telescopes up and on the pads. They are 13.5 meter dishes and are looking at big structures in the cosmos. Looks like they have done a shakedown of controls! The radio signals are converted over to visible spectrum signals we can see, so yes, I know, it is not a "photo of the galactic center" (that should be coming with project Event Horizon sometime this year) per se, but it is still pretty dang cool!

This is only the beginning! They have all 64 antennae up but they are not at their target operating frequency. This is kind of first shot at a lower frequency (750 MHz) with a final target of 4 GHz.

After that, who knows? They can link up radio telescopes, both ground based and space based, to get a very long baseline interferometry where radio signals from distant sources are stitched together to create large virtual apertures. That will be great if another neutron star merger is detected!

This is new. This is cool! And with Webb space telescope pushing the launch date further back, this is as good as it gets!

Wikipedia links:
MeerKAT
Radio interferometry (mainly, but radio telescopes in general)

Wow this gets my paredoilia working overtime, anyone else see the baby face to the bottom right of the bright flare in the centre?

originally posted by: muzzleflash
a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

I propose that something is going on there that is completely different than what our theories predict.

The fact no one knows what they are looking at is a good indication of that.

I agree, humans like to name and qualify things so that we then feel we "know" what its about, and can then move onto naming the next unknown(until it has a name!).

a reply to: IgnoranceIsntBlisss

I know. But the electric universe claims are distinct and separate. So I called it out as different things. Which is part of my problem with the electric universe theory. Since Maxwell, they are the same and not separate. That is the basis for relativity.

But not trying to rain on anybody’s parade, either! It’s all good. And that is why there is science... to prove an idea that can predict other outcomes.

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

Awesome thread Teo!

The instant i looked at that picture, the idea of a nucleus of many black holes came to mind.

Then, bare with me...

Each black hole isnt just a gateway to another Universe.

Each black hole is a Universe.

originally posted by: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

Credit: SARAO

This image shows filaments of particles, structures that seem to exist in alignment with the galaxy’s central black hole. It’s unclear what causes these filaments. Maybe they are particles ejected by the spinning black hole; maybe they are hypothesized “cosmic strings;” and maybe they’re not unique, and there are other, similar structures waiting to be found, according to a 2017 release from Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.

These look like Burkeland currents to me. Charged particles that follow magnetic field lines.

Flowing charged particles, or electric currents, create a magnetic field that twists around itself thus creating a Birkeland current. Sometimes these currents twist around themselves like a rope due to attraction/repulsion forces, I see several of what looks like twisting currents.

If these are indeed Birkeland currents than it will be interesting to discover where all of these charged particles are coming from. A giant "Galactic Wind" perhaps?

a reply to: Devino

Funny how Birkeland currents are only defined as happening on Earth (a set of currents that flow along geomagnetic field lines connecting the Earth’s magnetosphere to the Earth's high latitude ionosphere), but Electric Universe people took it and ran with it, applying it to the whole galaxy.

originally posted by: wildespace
a reply to: Devino

Funny how Birkeland currents are only defined as happening on Earth (a set of currents that flow along geomagnetic field lines connecting the Earth’s magnetosphere to the Earth's high latitude ionosphere), but Electric Universe people took it and ran with it, applying it to the whole galaxy.

Yes, the electric Universe people tend to run with a lot of things, don't they. Bless their hearts. I feel their intentions are good and I do understand their frustrations but it is important not to speculate too wildly.

The reason Birkeland currents have been positively identified around Earth's poles is because of in situ measurements by satellites. It's currently impossible to do this anywhere outside of our solar system. However similar these structures might resemble Birkeland currents we just don't know for sure. My frustration starts when the scientists from these studies don't even mention Birkeland let alone electric currents. Some even refer to Earth's polar currents as Auroral electrojets. Way to give credit to an innovative and brilliant pioneer,.. not.
From your link;

Auroral Birkeland currents carry about 100,000 amperes during quiet times[7] and more than 1 million amperes during geomagnetically disturbed times

Wiki
I have read that some measurements where over 10 million amps of electric current.

Earth isn't the only place Birkeland currents have been observed and measured.
Jupiter’s Auroras Present a Powerful Mystery

Laurel, Maryland, observed signatures of powerful electric potentials, aligned with Jupiter’s magnetic field, that accelerate electrons toward the Jovian atmosphere at energies up to 400,000 electron volts. This is 10 to 30 times higher than the largest auroral potentials observed at Earth,

We cannot measure electric currents flowing through a wire here on Earth from a satellite. In the case of a Birkeland current in space a spacecraft would need to physically pass through the current to measure it's electric flow. Anything else, I believe, would be speculation. It may look like a BC but is it?

Jupiter's Aurorae have nodes that seem to indicate interaction by it's Moons.

New research shows the closest-ever views of features in Jupiter's swirling auroras, revealing the complicated footprints left by its moons Io and Ganymede.

Space.com
So Jupiter has an electrical connection with our Sun and in turn some Jovian moons have a connection with Jupiter. It would be very difficult to imagine that this amount of potential energy has no affect other than a beautiful light show. Complicated interactions are happening here. Research into plasma physics has been ongoing for several decades and electromagnetism for centuries. All is needed is to apply what we already know.

As far as Birkeland currents existing outside of our solar system I would think it logical and reasonable to assume that the physics that work here would work out there as well.

Plasma physicists suggest that many structures in the universe exhibiting filamentation are due to Birkeland currents. Peratt notes that "Regardless of scale, the motion of charged particles produces a self-magnetic field that can act on other collections of charged particles, internally or externally.

Plasma-Universe.com
I try not to speculate too much as I feel you, among others here, deserve better. With that being stated I do find many filamentary structures that resemble Birkeland currents In images, we all have seen, of comets like 67P, moons like Saturn's moon Enceladus and the image in the OP from this thread. I try not to get too excited because I know we need more data and that takes time, and money. However I do wish that these brilliant scientists would at least consider the possibility that these might be electric currents.

Add; By "electric current" I mean an ionization of particles though a direct interaction of incoming charged particles via solar wind, for example, that separate due to magnetic filed lines.

a reply to: wildespace
I was watching the science channel a few days ago and they were talking about looking for planets outside our solar system that had auroras. Thinking how interesting that sounded I looked it up and found this article, apparently its old news (June 2015).

When scientists studied brown dwarf LSR J1835+3259, they noticed that it flashed once every two hours as it rotated. They decided to take a closer look with the Hale telescope in San Diego and the National Radio Astronomy Observatory in New Mexico, which captured optical and radio signals from the substellar object. Such signals are also emitted from commonly known auroras, though they had never been observed outside our solar system.

Source
It's a brown dwarf star that has an aurora one million times stronger than that of Earth's.

Sydney Chapman first proposed that Earth's auroras were internally produced some 100 years ago yet we later confirmed that they are caused by charged particles form our Sun, an electrical circuit that connects Earth and the Sun. As the Earth moves through the Sun's electric field, relatively speaking since the electric field also moves, the Earth induces an electric current. A similar thing happens with Jupiter and its moons.

As Jupiter's moons pass through the charged particles called plasma that surrounds it, researchers think the plasma interacts with Jupiter's magnetic field to spark features in the planet's electron auroras.

Space.com
Ganymede has a magnetic field and auroras;

New data on Jupiter's moon Ganymede, coming from a mission 20 years old, highlights the ways in which this very alien moon is surprisingly Earthlike: Auroras shine over its polar caps, it's cocooned by a strong magnetic field and it might even harbor oceans.
...
Ganymede is also a unique solar-system body because it's the only moon with an internally generated magnetosphere.

Space.com

Jupiter's moons seem to excite its auroras by way of their motion through Jupiter's magnetosphere. For a celestial body to have an aurora it seems that it must have a magnetic field and relative motion in and electric field. A few questions come to mind;
Does Jupiter emit charged particles similar to the Sun's solar wind?
Does Earth, Jupiter and the other gas giants create/excite auroras on our Sun similar to what we see on Jupiter with its moons?
What is causing the aurora on the brown dwarf LSR J1835+3259?
I would think it was moving through a field of charged particles but where are they coming from?

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

Yes definitely pretty neat. I am sure some things don't fit in electric universe theory. That said to me the scientists studying this seem to have better explanations and connections than the theories that follow black energy and matter. Tesla, the static electricity or voltage spikes as you get higher in the atmosphere, the way flames burn in space, the experiment that dropped a metal cable in the atmosphere and the fact that we know way less about magnetism electromagnetism and how water effects these things begged me to dive in. I like the idea of everything being a positive negative ying yang kind of thing. Or the thought the planets are like batteries and some of the similarities are very intriguing to me. I don't know the answers but I like comparing all options available. When they start talking about Berkland currents it has some connections worth while but seems very far fetch. Very interesting indeed.