From magnetic collapse to gravitational collapse: levels of understanding of magnetism.
Abstract
The paper reviews six subjects which illustrate recent insights into the nature of magnetism and its role in astrophysical phenomena. These include a computer analysis of the magnetic collapse of a star to produce two counterdirected jets of matter, three different ways to count and analyze the degrees of freedom of the magnetic field, the unity that special relativity establishes between electricity and magnetism, insights into the nature of electromagnetism provided by general relativity, the fate of electric and magnetic lines of force after the gravitational collapse of a cloud of matter to a black hole, and implications of the ultimate collapse of space and time for the laws of magnetism. It is shown why the magnetic field possesses only two degrees of freedom per spacepoint, how electricity can be pictured as lines of force trapped in the topology of space, that magnetism is the manifestation of electricity in motion, and that the existence of electric charge implies that space is multiply connected on the small scale.
- Publication:
-
Role of Magnetic Fields in Physics and Astrophysics
- Pub Date:
- August 1975
- DOI:
- 10.1111/j.1749-6632.1975.tb36090.x
- Bibcode:
- 1975NYASA.257..189W
- Keywords:
-
- Gravitational Collapse;
- Magnetic Effects;
- Stellar Evolution;
- Stellar Magnetic Fields;
- Black Holes (Astronomy);
- Computerized Simulation;
- Cosmology;
- Degrees Of Freedom;
- Electromagnetism;
- Relativity;
- Astrophysics