Photo Source: NASA
Naturally Formed Cold Plasma (blue), Escaping Earth's Ionosphere From South Pole

I would like to mention the fact that there are a few countries experimenting with using plasma as a force field around an object. First of all, lets discuss what plasma is. It is usually very hot and is a collection of charged particles that look like gas, but can conduct electricity and be effected by magnetism. It is sometimes used as a restraining force to hold things in place, such as objects that reach very high temperatures, such as those on the sun or higher. In a sense, we have been using plasma containment fields for quite a while now. Here is the problem however, if you were to put a plasma umbrella over an object, even a metal one, it would melt, due to its high temperature. That is being dealt with in the lab as we try and develop cold plasma. If we succeed, plasma might just be strong enough to protect an object from explosions occurring outside it. Cold plasma has been created in labs in small quantities. Not only does it have the ability to shield something from explosions and penetration, but it might be able to make things invisible to radar or even our eyes. The potential is there and who can be sure that we haven't already developed it? It has another potential ability and that is in the area of sterilization. A lab in the U.S. has been able to produce a lot of cold plasma and they used a device that cost under $1,000. To produce plasma using a fusion reactor costs millions of dollars.

The Earth's ionosphere is really a plasma. Plasma has been referred to as the fourth state of matter. The states of matter are:
1. Gas
2. Liquid
3. Solid
It is said that over 99% of the known universe is composed of plasma. It is usually found in interstellar space. So how is cold plasma created in the lab? A plexiglas cube is used that has helium gas inside of it. Electricity is used in a special manner and it flows through the gas. It is said that the extraction or conversion to plasma can be scaled up to any size. There is a pending patent, so the process is still really a secret at this time. Sometimes decontamination is a time consuming process, but if decontamination is carried out using cold plasma, it could be accomplished in a few minutes. Why is it so fast? That is because it disrupts cell membranes in the culprit bacterial spores.

No one has said this, but I have the feeling that maybe cold plasma might be able to get rid of contaminates on the battlefield. If a bacterial agent was released and detected in time, it might be used to destroy it. It is claimed that if you stick your finger into a cold plasma, you only feel a tingle and no harm is done. It it is not harmful to humans, this would be a great boon to the human race. Have we discovered something here that might completely change the way some things are done in hospitals and doctor's offices? Staph infection is a very bad thing and happens to patients in many hospitals. If cold plasma could be used to kill all germs and bacteria, this might not be a threat anymore, in the near future. The thing is that the scientists don't really understand yet how this cold plasma works. Look at electricity, no one really knows what it is. Oh they know how it works alright and they know how to control it, but they never learned exactly what it is. This is what might happen with cold plasma, it might work fine, yet we may not be able to understand why.

I have to admit it, what excites me the most about this discovery is its potential to protect a space craft. I am almost willing to bet that my readers knew that I was going to say that. I have talked many times about space travel and how we need shielding to protect our astronauts from radiation and solar flares. Being protected from impacts and even weapons fire, would be an added bonus. Right now, even using the fastest engine we have, astronauts going to Mars would receive too much radiation. Shielding our ship with lead would make it to heavy to launch. One solution that has been discussed, which I think is inefficient, is to build one room on the ship that is shielded with lead and have everyone run into it, if there is a radiation danger. What kind of sense does this really make? It seems to me that this is like telling the crew that you can't really protect them. Another thing, this doesn't protect anyone from being hit, even by micro meteors, where the cold plasma would create a shield against these things. Cold plasma is far from being able to do any of this yet, as far as I can tell, but as I said above, we may have a secret government project that is far more advanced.

The U.S. Air Force is very interested in developing cold plasma and has underwritten some of the experiments. This doesn't surprise me, because the Air Force would be a very good match for cold plasma shields. Even if only small shields could be developed, it would be quite helpful to them. They might be able to shield some of their electronics with it. Talk was that satellites might benefit greatly from some successful research in this area. Look what happened earlier this year, when the Chinese seemed to blow a satellite out of the sky. I say seemed to, because I have no way of knowing if they had planted explosives before the launch of their satellite. Anyway, a shield around a satellite might prevent this from happening. It is said that the work on cold plasma is advancing at a rapid pace. It would be nice to know if anything we have learned so far has been put to use, but I am sure it is a military secret.

Will the field of cold plasma research grow so much that someday everyone will have perfected it and every country will have shields? If this happens, than the next thing we will be working on is a way to penetrate those shields. Seems wasteful doesn't it? This is the way that things always go. Defensive walls were built to keep out invading armies. They developed rock throwing machines to knock down the walls. The walls were built much thicker and the new invention, the cannon, was used. No wall could stand under its pounding. This kind of stuff has been going on forever, only today it is much more expensive and deadly. I guess the bottom line is that dead is dead. It doesn't matter if you died from a rock, arrow, bullet or bomb. You will be just as dead. Maybe other uses will be found for cold plasma? Would it make a good fuel for an ion engine for example? Lets hope that not everything that comes out of the lab on this one is designed for war.