The iron core of stars; super nova

[pioneer]

The current understanding is that the core of older stars is composed of iron since this is the final exothermic atom to form and is heavier than all the lighter atoms.

 

This has a conceptual problem that needs to be investigated. It has to do with the definition of density, with is mass/volume. At the temperatures of the core, will the iron be totally ionized? If it still retains even one electron in a stable orbital configuration its volume will increase, thereby lowering its density by many orders of magnitude. It will become a walnut in a football field. It will only take 55-60 hydrogen peas in the same football field to exhibit the same or higher density. Here is an analogy if we put a chunk of iron in water it will sink. If we fabricate it into the shape of a boat, so there is open space, it floats on lighter material.

 

If we go at this the other way, and have the iron core fully ionized, is only the weight of a iron nucleus sufficient to overcome the repulsion of 26 protons (positive charges) with a core of iron with maybe 10-15 positive charges all exposed? That does not seem likely. If the Fe is neutral to make it earier to sink, won't is become too fluffy to sink? How close does H have to be to be able to fuse. Is is more than 55-60 peas in a stadium?

 

Here is what I see. What we have is a fusion core, mostly hydrogen. Then maybe an iron shell composed of iron atoms that have gathered orbital electrons. The iron still sinks if it is entrained higher, but this outer shell above the core, is as low as the iron is able to sink on the fusion sea.

 

If we bubble gas from the bottom of a pool of water the bubbles and water sort of combine and just well over. Solar flares do not just well over but act almost like eruptions. This suggests the iron shell, above the core, is a type of crustal shell. As pressure builds in the fusion core, the pressure breeches a weak spot in iron shell, causing a jet of pressure. That would make sunstops, thickened iron areas that shield core heat.

[Martin]

pioneer, you are focusing on the wrong thing.

 

focus on the ELECTRONS, not the nuclei

 

What keeps a burntout star from collapse (below the Chandra mass threshhold) is ELECTRON DEGENERACY PRESSURE

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electron_degeneracy_pressure

 

what determines the density is how many electrons you can crowd into a given space---ignoring electrostatic repulsion---

and then you throw in the right number of nuclei to make it electrically neutral.

the nuclei provide the MASS per unit volume but the NUMBER of nuclei you can crowd into a given volume

is directly proportional to the number of electrons----because overall the charge must balance out.

 

so what you have to study is the crowding of electrons, and how the Heisen Uncert Princ, or more exactly the Pauli Exclusion Principle, of the electrons

resists crowding. This business of studying the electon crowding is what the young Chandrasekhar did in 1931-1935, and he discovered the

famous Chandrasekhar Limit (how much iron you can have before it makes a supernova, namely 1.4 solar mass.)

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chandrasekhar_Limit

[pioneer]

Thanks for the insight and references, Martin. But the question I asked had to do whether the iron is fully ionized. If the electrons are free to move around, such that no iron has it own personal electrons, things can get closer and much denser. If an atom retains, any personal electrons, there will be stricted electron space around it.

 

For example, in chemical bonding, atoms can get closer when they share electrons. The more electrons that are shared, such as in double and triple covalent bonds, the closer the atoms will get to each other. What prevents getting any closer are the electrons that don't share. These create zones in space, associated with each atom, where space is restricted.

 

If we had fully ionized iron, there is no restricted space, allowing the iron atoms to get close. If iron gains any electrons, that remain permanently attached (nonionized) the restricted space between iron atoms grows. The little H proton is so small, it will never gain a permanent electron at the conditions within the sun. The electrons will alway be sharing among all the H, more or less, so restricted space never gets in the way of the H getting denser and denser, jst as long as charge balances.

 

Even if one asumes fully ionized iron with extreme energy electrons moving in a way that creates, essentially, one huge iron molecule, it would appear to me that electrons would hit the iron nuclei, to make neutrons, causing the iron to disintegrate into smaller atoms. By gaining some electrons to become bigger in space, it can float up and away from the fusion energy, where it has less electron energy, remaining stable.

 

It would still be a huge iron molecule, but with electron void space. In this orientation there is plenty of room for free range H-protons to diffuse into fusion core. Even if they need electrons to maintain charge, they conduct/share the electrons that are within the iron molecule shell. They only need to entrain the electrons of the inside of the floating iron shell.

[JackMuChabas]

Iron cores in a sun is not possible but only after a supernova. Too stable to burn and would disaffect other molecules to compose in stable molecules.

[iNow]

Iron cores in a sun is not possible but only after a supernova. Too stable to burn and would disaffect other molecules to compose in stable molecules.

 

Wow... so you're right and those folks at NASA and other well researched areas are wrong? Who'da thunk it?

 

http://observe.arc.nasa.gov/nasa/space/stellardeath/stellardeath_3.html

 

 

Seriously. If you're going to make such outlandish claims, at least offer some outlandish evidence, or better, some real research supporting your position.

[pioneer]

The reality of the sun's anatomy, is that nobody knows for sure what is going on inside, until we have hard data. The best we can do is make an educated guess. For example, if an alien creature was found, we could all stand around and guess at its internal anatomy. Eventually, some type of consenus would form, based on what we know on the earth. If we took a meat cleaver (already dead) and cut it in half, the odds are, there would be all types of things nobody anticipated. As long as we keep it whole (no hard data) we can all go along with the consensus and be satisfied. Some may look at this best guess into a type of dogma and then extrapolate as though it is actually based on hard data, never realizing it is just the best guess we are able to formulate without looking inside.

 

That being said, since we can't cut the sun in half and actually see the reality of the situation, we are limited to extrapolating what we know. At the very least, the consensus theory needs to be conceptually consistent across the board. One can not put things in place that have conceptual problems simply because consensus science wants some closure. That is why I asked the question of iron being fully ionized. Depending on how we answer that question conceptally changes the analysis. We still don't know what is inside the alien sun, but our guess should be a little closer. If we leave it unanswered then who knows if an error is being propagated all the way through our analysis of the universe until we are way off.

 

Say the concensus believes the alien has one heart. We all accept that and then take this to the next and then the next step. If it turns out it has two hearts, then everything that was accepted is way off. So what does science do at that point, let the house of cards fall or hide the data since this would throw sand in the gears of a well oiled machine. The machine is doing its job well, but it may not be designed for the sand. Maybe it is well designed and can handle the sand, but we need to see.

 

My gut tells me that the iron will not remain fully ionized and exist as one huge iron molecule that is sharing all the electrons. There will not be enough space for all the electrons to arrange themselves in way to allow their magnetic addition to be anything but repulsive. The electrons will end up with too much magnetic repulsion, due to their motion, such that charge balance will be hard to maintain as electrons push outward This will cause the iron nuclei to charge separate. The iron will need to get some of those electrons into orbitals to help reduce magnetic repulsion of the electrons so it can maintain better charge balance. Hydrogen does not suffer this same problem, since the hydrogen is very small and energetic enough to contribute to positive magnetic attraction during close quarters.

 

I don' t see what the problem is with putting the iron above the fusion core. It makes it easier to explain sunspots and solar flares without having to pull a rabbit out of the hat with elaborate theories. But these are actually needed because the heart is assumed in the wrong place. The science is doing it job. But conceptually inconsistencies make it harder.