Can the earth's earths generate energy? Physicists argue about controversial assertion
Can the earth's earths generate energy? Physicists argue about controversial assertion
electricity can be generated from the energy of the earth, which rotates through its own magnetic field - this claims physicists in a provocative study that was published today.
The results are controversial, but also fascinating, the researchers report in the Nature journal. The effect was only identified in a carefully constructed device and only produced 17 microvolt - this is a fraction of the tension that is released when firing a single neuron - which makes it difficult to check whether another effect does not cause the observations.
is the phenomenon real and could be enlarged the device, it could create emission -free energy while it remains inpatient. This could be useful in remote areas or for medical applications. The authors published their results in Physical Review Research and presented them at a conference of the American Physical in Anaheim, California.
"The idea is a bit contraguitive and has been discussed since Faraday," says Paul Thomas, emeritus physicist at the University of Wisconsin - Eeau Claire. However, the experiments led by Christopher Chyba, a physicist at Princeton University in New Jersey, have been carried out very carefully, he adds. "I find it very convincing and remarkable."
other agree that the results are conspicuous, but remain skeptical. Rinke Wijngaarden, a retired physicist who previously worked at the Free University of Amsterdam, has followed the authors' claims since 2016 and could not find the effect in its own experiments 2018 . He finds the work very interesting, but is "still sure that the theory of Chyba et al. Cannot be correct".
Planeteal electricity
In theory, the device would function similarly to an electricity plant in which the pulling through a ladder through a magnetic field sets electrons and thus generates a current. Since the earth rotates and part of its magnetic field remains static (at least According to evidence of 1912 ), a head on your surface would be passed through some components of the field.
Usually this would not generate electricity, since in a homogeneous field such as that of the earth, the electrons that feel this pressure would be re -arranged in order to generate a conflicting electrical force, which ultimately leaves the loads static (this does not apply to places where the force that a ladder feels, is constantly varied, as in a generator).
But Chyba and his colleagues claim that they found a loophole. With a complex calculation, they showed that certain materials - with unusual properties and in the form of cylindrical tubes - could lead the earth's magnetic field into a strange configuration. This would argue that this would generate a magnetic pressure that the electrostatic force in the device could not compensate for, creating a current.
In order to demonstrate their theory, the researchers constructed a hollow cylinder from a soft magnetic material that contains manganese, zinc and iron. If other effects are checked at the same time, they searched for any voltage and electricity that flow through the device. The result confirmed its predictions: they observed a tiny voltage of 17 μV that depended on the direction of the device in relation to the magnetic field of the earth. The voltage was zero when they used a fixed piece of the ladder instead of a hollow tube.
"The observed tensions are so low that many potential disruptive factors exist," says Wijngaarden, but points out that Chyba's team has made great efforts to "imitate their predicted phenomenon, such as temperature variations.
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chyba, C. F., Hand, K. P. & Chyba, T. H. Phys. Rev. Res. 7, 013285 (2025).