#7. Plasma

(Files in red–history)

Index

4. Electrons

4H. Thomson, 1896

4a. Electric Fluid

5. Field Lines

5H. Faraday 1846

6. EM Waves

7. Plasma

7a. Fluorescent lamp

7H. Langmuir, 1927

8. Positive Ions

In the lower atmosphere where we live, any atom that loses an electron (say, by being hit by a fast cosmic ray particle) soon recaptures it or one like it. The situation is quite different at high temperatures, such as exist on the Sun. The hotter the gas, the faster its atoms and molecules move, and at very high temperatures, the collisions between such fast-moving atoms are violent enough to rip off electrons. In the Sun's atmosphere, a large fraction of the atoms at any time is "ionized" by such collisions, and the gas acts as a plasma.

Unlike cool gases (e.g. air at room temperature), plasmas conduct electricity and are strongly affected by magnetic fields. The fluorescent lamp, widely used in the home and at work, contains a rarefied inert gas with a fraction of a percent mercury vapor, which produces a plasma when heated and agitated by electricity, from the power line to which the lamp is connected. The power line makes one end electrically positive, the other negative (see drawing below) causing (+) ions to be accelerated towards the (-) end, and (-) electrons to the (+) end. The accelerated particles gain energy, collide with atoms, eject additional electrons and thus maintain the plasma, even if some other particles re-combine. The collisions also cause mercury atoms to emit light, and in fact, this source of light is more efficient than conventional lightbulbs. Neon signs and streetlights operate on a similar principle, and some plasma devices are (or were) used in electronics.

In case you ask

alternating current

more about the fluorescent lamp

As noted, the Sun consists of plasma. Another important plasma in nature is the ionosphere, starting about 70-80 km above ground. Here electrons are torn off atoms by sunlight of short wavelengths, ranging from the ultra-violet to X-rays: they do not recombine too readily because the atmosphere becomes increasingly rarefied at high altitudes and collisions are not frequent. The lowest part of the ionosphere, the "D layer" at 70-90 km, still has enough collisions to cause it to disappear after sunset. Then the remaining ions and electrons recombine, while in the absence of sunlight new ones are no longer produced. However, that layer is re-established at sunrise. Above 200 km, collisions are so infrequent that the ionosphere persists day and night.

The topside ionosphere extends many thousands of km into space and merges with the magnetosphere, whose plasmas are generally more rarefied but also much hotter. The ions and electrons of the magnetospheric plasma come in part from the ionosphere below, in part from the solar wind (next paragraph), and many details of their entry and heating are still unclear.

Finally, there exists the interplanetary plasma--the solar wind. The outermost layer of the Sun, the corona, is so hot that not only are all its atoms ionized, but those which have started off with many electrons have several of them (sometimes all of them) torn off, including deeper-lying electrons which are more strongly attached. For instance, characteristic light has been detected in the corona from iron which has lost 13 electrons.

This extreme temperature also prevents the plasma of the corona from being held captive by the Sun's gravity, and instead it flows out in all directions, filling the solar system far beyond the most distant known planets. Through the solar wind the Sun shapes the Earth's distant magnetic field, and the wind's fast flow (~400 km/s) supplies the energy which ultimately powers the polar aurora, the radiation belts and magnetic storm phenomena.

#7. Plasma

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