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Throw the switch, develop the film, and flip through the photos. We show the results below in four photos from Camera A (the side view) and five from Camera B (the end view).
Photos 1 show the filaments. In photos 2, the wires vaporize into thin plasma filaments. In photos 3, the plasma pinches together because of the two magnetic fields. In photos 4, - - - well look at that. The gaseous filaments twist around each other tighter and tighter resembling a tornado, braided hair, water down the drain, and our DNA. We might have guessed these results because of the odd way our compass pointed around the electrical wire; right-angle forces are at work again. With camera B, one extra photo, photo 5, shows what took place next, something even more amazing: The two little balls of plasma started stretching out and merging together. In later photos, they ended up looking exactly like a spiral galaxy.
These indoor experiments will explain how the outdoors works.
WHAT WAS THE FIRST CLUE THAT PLASMA MEANT
MORE THAN LABORATORY TRICKS
Hopefully, you've been out in the countryside on some wintry evening and seen the aurora borealis, the northern lights. If not, you have missed one of the most spectacular sights in our skies; I've watched them for hours. From Minnesota, they look like white, blue, and green curtains of light. They wave above the northern horizon, up, down, and across the sky. Sometimes they will shoot southward until they are directly overhead and even farther. What are they?
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