Plasma Cosmology

Plasma physics is essential for understanding the universe on all scales, including the largest, the realm of cosmology. Both Alfven and Lerner used plasma physics in their critiques of the popular Big Bang theory of cosmic history. It is quite possible that new discoveries in the cosmos in the future will again, as in the past, lead to new possibilities of technology. Indeed, discoveries in cosmology and fusion have been closely linked.

In May, 2014, Lerner and colleagues Renato Falomo and Riccardo Scarpa published new evidence indicating that the universe is not in fact expanding. “Questions and Answers on The Science of Surface Brightness” gives more technical details on this study. Here are biographical sketches of the research team members, and background on “The Growing Case against the Big Bang Theory”.

Lerner elaborated this research in a 2018 paper published in the leading journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. The new study, titled “Observations contradict galaxy size and surface brightness predictions that are based on the expanding universe hypothesis”, finds that none of the published expanding-universe predictions of galaxy-size growth fit the actual data. All of the proposed physical mechanisms for galaxy growth, such as galaxy mergers, also contradict observations. However, the paper finds that the data are closely fit by the contrary hypothesis that the universe is not expanding, and that the redshift of light is caused by some other, currently unknown, process.

In 2020, Lerner presented to the American Astronomical Society meeting a new study showing that bedrock predictions of the Big Bang are contradicted by observations. The study looks at the origin and abundance of three key light elements that are hypothesized to have been created by the Big Bang.  Precise amounts of helium, deuterium and lithium are predicted to have been formed by fusion reactions in the dense, extremely hot initial instants of the Big Bang.

For both lithium and helium, the study shows, observations of abundances in old stars now differ from predictions by more than a dozen standard deviations and the gap has been widening at an accelerating pace. The oldest stars have less than half the helium and less than one tenth the lithium than that predicted by Big Bang Nucleosynthesis theory. The lowest lithium levels observed are less than 1% that predicted by the theory. Indeed, the evidence is consistent with no helium or lithium having been formed before the first stars in our galaxy.

LPPFusion has started a new monthly video series on the Crisis in Cosmology exploring the scientific evidence that the dominant model of cosmology is invalid. Instead, the basic phenomena of the cosmos can be understood without an origin in time for the universe, and without exotic hypothetical entities like inflation, dark energy and dark matter. A second audio/podcast series on the implications of cosmology, called “Cosmic Connections” is also underway.

To dig deeper, here are technical papers from 2005 and earlier. Here are summaries of some discoveries from 2003, 2005 and 2007 and a reply to a critique from Ned Wright, a Big Bang defender.