October 16, 2019
Showing 2 comments
Leave a Comment
This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.
This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.
Ah, so this is what the SuspectSky channel has been talking about
Disappointed I’ve been busy and missed this one until today. Excellent overview of a great topic!
Something not often discussed in regards to the mainstream explanations is that the waveform of FRB’s really does bear an uncanny resemblance to much more powerful fast burst signals we have observed and much more definitively associated with high-energy objects; quasars, pulsars, magnetars, and the like. That said alien technology still checks more of the boxes than the mainstream explanations, but has its own flaws.
I really feel like this is a topic begging for a plasma universe explanation that better fits all of the observations, and one that I feel like there are a number of possibilities to explore.
Personally, I’m fond of current sheets in one way or another. Magnetic filtering or refraction of a more powerful repeating signal through a current sheet in space is high on my list of considerations. The magnetic field of the current sheet itself would be capable of polarizing, filtering, and/or refracting the right signals passing through it. We would also end up confused as to the source due to the bending and slowing as it passes through the sheet. If just this is the case it may be possible to use the dispersion measure to determine the degree of refraction in order to locate the primary source point.
The possibilities start to get really interesting though when you consider the make-up of current sheets in space.
First off, the dust in the plasma and its concentrations have the potential to produce a filtering effect.
Second, much of this dust is field-aligned along the current of the sheet, which could lend its own filtering and refractive properties to signals passing through depending on dust composition.
Finally, much of the dust we do see in space has piezoelectric and/or thermoelectric properties. A field-aligned sheet of piezoelectric material bears a striking resemblance to a lot of essential radio components here on earth. I think its well worth considering if FRB’s may be a current sheet acting as a natural antenna and transceiver. If this is the case we may be able to learn a lot about the composition and nature of plasmas in space through analysis of FRB’s.
What I find most intriguing in this line of thought is looking at the structure of a current sheet as a whole. A field-aligned arrangement of piezoelectric particles is a crystal. To what degree are the particles in a plasma behaving individually, as opposed to collectively under the influence of the sheets fields? As outside forces (magnetic fields and high energy phenomena) impinge on the fields forming the sheet altering its shape or strength is there any sort of large scale piezoelectric response across the structure as a whole?
Essentially, does a piezoelectric plasma sheet behave similar to a piezoelectric crystal sheet, or is there no coherence among the field aligned piezoelectric particles in a plasma?
In the end, no matter how you look at it, there are many reasons plasma sheets and filaments and other plasma universe structures should be considered as a potential source of FRB’s, given how lacking the current explanations are. It’s also always worth keeping in mind how we detect, manipulate, and produce given frequencies ourselves; it’s never magic, we are always utilizing some interesting natural properties of various materials to do so. In the case of radio, piezoelectric crystals and films are a key component, and it’s well worth considering in what ways they may exist in space.