• Question: Can you describe the state Plasma in more detail, what are its properties or particles like?

    Asked by 08khanumk to Peta, Andrew, Daniel, Hayley, Natalia on 18 Nov 2011. This question was also asked by markbarwell, metemercan2011.
    • Photo: Peta Foster

      Peta Foster answered on 17 Nov 2011:

      Hi! Great question!

      So a plasma is often described as a hot ionised gas, however it does not really need to be a gas. Basically it is a state of matter where the atoms are predominantly ionised. Now it is very likely that this will occur when matter gets very hot, like in the sun. In the sun there is so much heat in the form of light around that atoms are continuously being bombarded with light that has the potential to ionise it… so the sun is a big ball of ionised gas that is so hot it is fusing. 🙂

      Now when you ionises atoms you end up with negative electrons and positive ions and because these are attached to each other the other lot interacts with each other as a kind of collective and is another way we describe a plasma.

      Matter is is predominantly ionised and exhibits collective behaviour.

      One example of this behaviour is that the plasma can support waves. So if you push some of the electrons out then they wizz back, overshoot and wizz back again and the process sets up an oscillation in the plasma which is at the plasma frequency.

      I hope this helps 😀

    • Photo: Daniel Scully

      Daniel Scully answered on 17 Nov 2011:

      Plasma is made when you make a material so hot that the electrons are torn off their atoms.

      This happens in the centre of stars, and one of the methods for making Nuclear Fusion requires a plasma to be made and kept in a chamber.

      Plasmas can behave in very strange ways, particularly with electric and magnetic fields.

    • Photo: Hayley Smith

      Hayley Smith answered on 18 Nov 2011:

      The Sun chucks out charged particles all of the time, this is called the solar wind and is an example of a plasma. This may seem a long way off and something that’s difficult to relate too, but it’s really interesting. This solar wind hurtles towards Earth, when it gets close it interacts with the Earth’s magnetic field. This interaction of charged particles and magnetic field is impressive – it’s what can be seen around the poles, the northern or southern lights! It is possible to see this from England sometimes, but you need to be on quite northerly latitudes to get the best views! The charged particles in the solar wind (plasma) interact with the Earth’s magnetic field and this causes them to spiral around the field lines and emit radiation in the form of visible light as they go – the northern lights are bright bands or curtains of light bouncing around they sky and they really are magical to see!

Comments