The Plasma Universe

SEP 01, 1986

A model based on the emissions and behavior of the most prevalent material in the universe leads one to view the world as an active and rapidly changing place, and helps one analyze the development of its components.

DOI: 10.1063/1.881039

Hannes Alfvén

For millennia we have based our views of the universe on observations in the narrow visual octave of the electromagnetic spectrum, 400–800 nm, supplemented during the last half‐century by infrared and radio observations. During the last decade, however, space research has opened the full spectrum, including the entire infrared region and the ultraviolet, x‐ray and γ‐ray regions (see the photo on the cover and figure 1).

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References

1. P. Carlqvist, “On the acceleration of cosmic particles by electrostatic double layers,” submitted to IEEE Trans. Plasma Sci., special issue on plasma and cosmic plasma, in press (1986).
2. H. Alfvén, Cosmic Plasma, Astrophys. and Space Sci. Library 82, Reidel, Dordrecht, The Netherlands (1981). An analysis of the drastic revision of cosmic plasma physics produced by in situ measurements in the magnetosphere.
3. H. Alfvén, Phys. Scr. T2/1, 10 (1982). https://doi.org/PHSTBO
A brief summary of Cosmic Plasma and a list of ten different fields of cosmic‐plasma physics where space research is producing a “paradigm transition.” See also H. Alfvén, Geophys. Res. Lett. 10, 487 (1983).https://doi.org/GPRLAJ
4. H. Alfvéen, “Double layers and circuits in astrophysics,” submitted to IEEE Trans. Plasma Sci., special issue on plasma and cosmic plasma, in press (1986).
5. T. Potemra, ed., Proc. Chapman Conf. On Magnetospheric Current Systems, AGU Geophys. Monogr. 28 (1984).
A. Williams, ed., report from the workshop on double layers in astrophysics, NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala. (1986).
6. C.‐G. Falthammar, “Magnetosphere‐ionosphere interactions—near‐Earth manifestations of the plasma universe,” submitted to IEEE Trans. Plasma Sci., special issue on plasma and cosmic plasma, in press (1986).
7. H. Alfvén, G. Arrhenius, Structure and Evolutionary History of the Solar System, Reidel, Dordrecht, The Netherlands (1975).
H. Alfvén, G. Arrhenius, Evolution of the Solar System, NASA Sci. Publ. 345, US Government Printing Office, Washington, DC (1976). Two monographs that demonstrate the basic importance of plasma phenomena in the evolutionary history of the Solar System. The 1976 publication is much more detailed.
8. H. Alfvén, I. Axnäs, N. Brenning, P.‐A. Lindqvist, Planet. Space Sci. 34, 145 (1986). A demonstration that practically the whole complicated pattern of the Saturnian C ring and essential features of the A and B rings can be accounted for with an accuracy of better than 1%. The beginning of a transformation of cosmogony from speculation to real science.https://doi.org/PLSSAE
9. H. Alfvén, in Asteroids. Comets. Meteors: Exploration and Theoretical Modelling, C.‐I. Lagerkvist, H. Rickman, eds., Astronomical Observatory, Box 515, S‐751 28 Uppsala, Sweden (1984).

More about the authors

Hannes Alfvén, Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden.