Proton or Electron Star?

[WestAir]

Question for your intelligent types,

Is it possible to create a celestial ball of either electrons or protons? I know the weak force is something like 38 orders of magnitude weaker than magnetism (and same charged particles repulse each other), but is it possible for gravity to overcome the repulsion and form an electron or proton star?

If it could exist, what would it look like?

[EzinX]

EM is too many orders of magnitude stronger than gravity, so no.

[sal_vager]

These may explain it better WestAir

http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/askasci/phy05/phy05230.htm

https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/116921/can-there-be-electron-and-or-proton-stars

[LordFerret]

I remember reading once, a good few years back, about some cosmological study being done of distant interstellar 'dust' clouds... and how one had been discovered with a 'molecular signature' of biological components - the irony of which was the indication was that it was a cloud of 'vinegar'. Go figure that one. So, like, we're salad? lol

[Ralathon]

Not happening unless its a black hole.

F(gravity) = G*M/r^2

F(charge) = k*q/r^2

As you can see both forces follow the same behavior. One kg of protons has an electric charge of about 9.6e7 coulombs and k > G. So the only possible scenario where gravity can win from the electromagnetic forces is inside a black hole. But you aren't really talking about pure protons or electrons at that point.

[MBobrik]

Basically, every ordinary star is a electron/proton/alpha particle mixture star. Separate proton star ? even if it somehow held together, instead of falling apart immediately, its electrical field intensity would be strong enough to cause dielectric breakdown of the vacuum itself, and it would discharge back to ordinary hydrogen and a spray of positrons and gamma rays.

[Z-Man]

And even for black holes, there are (believed to be) limits on how much charge they can have:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reissner%E2%80%93Nordstr%C3%B6m_metric#Charged_black_holes

The limit on the charge/mass ratio is of the same order of magnitude as for regular gravitationally bound objects.

[problemecium]

Yep. I agree with the above on all counts, particularly the first reply. Think about this: batteries work because some of the electrons from one side have been stolen and stashed on the other side, where they must wait for a conductive object (wire) to connect the ends in order to return. Even a tiny fraction of the electrons is enough to create a sizable charge. I don't have the exact numbers here, but one electron being "stolen" equates to a tiny fraction of a volt - something like a millionth of a billionth. A bolt of lightning averages about 30 million volts, making 30 million times however many electrons make a volt. And the number of electrons in a piece of matter is the number of atoms in it times the number of electrons per atom (usually the same as the atomic number) - so a liter of water, for example, has about 3.3x10^26 electrons in it - billions of lightning bolts' worth. If you took that many protons or electrons and nothing of the opposite charge to contain that energy, well... in the end making a "proton star" even the size of a melon would result in an explosion many times more powerful than an atomic bomb.

[Kryten]

That's not what a volt is.

[WestAir]

Is it possible at all to have a celestial object with a positive or negative charge?

[Aethon]

How about a strange quark star?

http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2014/04/strange-quark-stars-does-one-actually-exist-in-a-nearby-supernova-research-suggests-that-neutron-stars-may-gradually-tran.html

[dansmithers]

Is it possible at all to have a celestial object with a positive or negative charge?

Yeah, you just have to rub a balloon against it really fast.

[-Velocity-]

Is it possible at all to have a celestial object with a positive or negative charge?

Yes, but it would be a weak charge. Most objects WILL in fact have some net weak positive or negative charge, simply because it's easy to knock electrons off or accept them, so it's highly unlikely for an object to be in a perfect balance. However, the charge will always be weak. Positive and negative charges are in equal number in this cosmos, and this balance of charge is also conserved in all interactions that I'm aware of. So it's really hard to make things keep any kind of significant charge separation over time- opposite charges will be attracted, additional like charges will be repelled, and the object will go towards charge neutrality.

Though electromagnetism is many, many, many, orders of magnitude stronger than gravity, because there are equal numbers of positive and negative charges in the cosmos and those charges neutralize each other, electromagnetism has little effect on large scale structures. Gravity rules there, because there are no negative gravitational "charges", and like gravitational "charges" attract.

However, because electrons are so mobile, they like to flow. When charges move, they and the electric fields they produce get length-contracted by Lorentz transformations. This gives rise to magnetic fields, which, while magnetic fields appear to be something different from electric fields, in reality, magnetic fields are just electric fields disguised by relativistic effects. All of Maxwell's equations for describing electromagnetics can be derived from just Coulomb's law and Relativity.

Anyway, I mention this because magnetic fields can have strong astrophysical effects- not nearly as strong as gravity though- and magnetic fields are, in a relativistic sense, nothing but electric fields.

[kerbiloid]

A photon star. A black hole consisting of large and dense pack of photons which never could leave it.

Upgraded version: a single photon with too short wave length that it's own mass prevents its own escape.

[Jovus]

Positive and negative charges are in equal number in this cosmos

Oh yeah? Prove it.

[ZetaX]

Oh yeah? Prove it.

It is up to a amount so miniscule we cannot make out the difference so far in the obsrevable universe. That's enough for all things concerned. You could say it is scientifically proven.

[Charzy]

Look up pair production. Charge is always conserved when matter is formed from energy, and since energy doesn't have a charge the net charge of the universe must equal 0.

[ZetaX]

Look up pair production. Charge is always conserved when matter is formed from energy, and since energy doesn't have a charge the net charge of the universe must equal 0.

Well, no, because you don't know the initial charge of the universe. We can with very high confidence assume it to be almost neutral, but perfect neutrality is essentially uncheckable.

[qeveren]

A photon star. A black hole consisting of large and dense pack of photons which never could leave it.

A Kugelblitz.

Upgraded version: a single photon with too short wave length that it's own mass prevents its own escape.

I don't think this version actually works. The energy of a photon depends on the reference frame of the observer, so you'd end up with a scenario where one observer sees a photon while another sees a black hole.

[kerbiloid]

A Kugelblitz.

Thanks, it was interesting to know about this.

[Guest]

New twist: Connecting twin star, proton and electron, with cable.

Edited December 7, 2014 by Guest