1971, Phys. Earth Planet. Interiors 4, 229232.
North-Holland Publishing Company, Amsterdam
THE RELATION OF ANGULAR MOMENTUM AND MAGNETIC FIELDS:
SCHUSTERS HYPOTHESIS REVISITED
JAMES W. WARWICK
University of Colorado, Boulder, Cob. 80302, U.S.A.
Almost 80 years ago, Arthur Schuster (SCHUSTER,
191 2)* suggested that every large rotating mass might be
a magnet. He was puzzled by the origin of the Earths
magnetism and had excluded the possibility that the
Earth was a permanent magnet or carried simple cur-
rent loops in its interior. His argument against current
loops was based on the rapid rate of decay of their
magnetic intensity on geological time scales. The same
case, of course, could be made today and is the princi-
pal argument in support of the self-exited dynamo
theory of the Earths field. This difficult theory now
holds the attention of all researchers on the origin and
properties of astronomical magnetism. Parenthetically
I may comment that one can only hope that this at-
tention is merited. Dynamo theory has not yet success-
fully predicted any cosmical fields. Its use today rests
on the assumption that no alternative theory corre-
sponds more closely to observations,
It has long since ceased to be fashionable to carry
out science as hypothetically as Schuster did. Never-
theless, the very recent observational development of
solar system magnetism, and to a lesser extent of other
astronomical objects, permits a far richer substantia-
tion of Schusters hypothesis than was possible for him.
My concern with it began only in June, 1969. I had
been asked to prepare a monograph on particles and
fields connected with the planet Jupiter. During this
task I discovered a two-line derivation of the strength
of Jupiters magnetic dipole moment, by MoRoz
(1967). Without an explicit reference to BLACKETTS
(1947) prior and identical treatment, Moroz derives a
value of Jupiters magnetic dipole within 10% of what
I will term the correct value, merely by equating the
* Schuster refers to a lecture he gave at the Royal Institution in
1891 as the first statement of the hypothesis.
229
ratio of angular momentum and dipole moment of the
Earth to that of Jupiter. By correct I mean the value
I have spent about ten years trying to establish from
interpretations of Jupiters radio emissions, which
provide the only observational basis.
In fact, I had heard of Schusters hypothesis many
years before when I selected my doctoral thesis topic.
At that time, H. W. Babcock had just discovered the
magnetic field of 78 Virginis. But I was concerned about
the strange abundances of rare earths in Ap stars, not
the origins of their magnetic fields.
Babcocks discovery was indirectly made possible
through Schusters hypothesis, which led George
Ellery Hale to construct the great 100 inch telescope
on Mt. Wilson. HALE (1915) said: It is not improbable,
as Schuster has suggested, that every star, and perhaps
every rotating body of whatever nature, becomes a
magnet through the fact of its rotation. It is hoped that
the 100 inchreflector will enable this test for magnetism
to be applied to certain stars.
Babcocks discovery stimulated Blackett to review
Schusters work. But Blackett had only three objects
on which to confirm the hypothesis. These were the
Earth, the Sun, and the star 78 Virginis. Blackett used
THIESSENS (1946) value of the Suns polar magnetic
field strength, 53 G, a value that today is considered
one or two orders of magnitude too large. He initially
assumed that the Suns moment of inertia corresponds
to a uniformly dense sphere of radius equal to the ob-
served solar radius. Combined with the observed
surface angular velocity, this value leads to almost one
order of magnitude too large an angular momentum.
In all honesty I have to admit that the distribution of
angular momentum through the Sun is in fact unknown.
Nevertheless, the ratio of L/M for the Earth and the
230 JAMES W. WARWICK
Sun are today by most astronomers considered to be
about what Blackett assumed, even though he used an
obviously excessive value of the polar field strength.
Blackett further pointed out that the ratio of angular
momentum to dipole moment for the spinning electron
is much too small to fit Schusters hypothesis. The non-
dimensional ratio G+m/e = 4.9 x 1022; this is the
ratio of the electrons gravitional mass to its charge in
electrostatic units. He noted that this is also the ratio
of the two Schuster constants, for massive astronomical
objects and for the spinning electron.
Blacketts advocacy of Schusters hypothesis was
criticized by Babcock on the basis of his observations
of variable stellar magnetic fields: The discovery that
the magnetic field ~ HD 125248 not only varies but
reverses its polarity in a regular cycle with a period of
about nine days~~ has raised serious doubts concerning
the suggested fundamental nature of the empirical
proportionality between magnetic moment and angular
momentum (BABCOCK, 1948). Babcock believed that
magnetic stars whose polarity reversed were magnetic
oscillators (SCHWARZSCHILD, 1949) and not rotating
stars. He also had found a number of magnetic stars
with irregular variations. These served to strengthen
further the argument against Schuster.
There are two comments supportive of Blackett that
should now be made. The first follows Blacketts
remark on the effects of convective motions that modify
a dipole field and produce complex observed fields.
Although this point of view would have been remote in
Schusters day, now we can consider the hypothesis
only in combination with the laws of hydromagnetics.
Even in the short interval since Blacketts paper, that
consideration has strengthened enormously. The second
point concerns the polarization reversals in magnetic
stars. It is abundantly clear that magnetic stars are
above all else rotators, rather than oscillators in the
Schwarzschild sense (see WOLFF, 1967). Their magnetic
dipole axis and their rotational axis do not coincide,
And, as Blackett implies, this obliquity relates to the
general problem of hydromagnetic convection, rather
than to the failure of Schusters hypothesis.
Blackett in 1947 had already suggested, exactly as
Moroz has done, a magnetic dipole moment for the
planet Jupiter scarcely different from the value I have
inferred observationally within the last ten years.
Whether or not this inference, or the interpretation of
Jupiters radio emission, are convincing, we today have
actual field measurements by magnetometers transport-
ed to the vicinity of the Moon, Venus and Mars. The
first Mariner fly-bys of Venus and Mars failed to detect
planetary magnetic fields. These provide upper limits
of the dipole moments consistent with Schusters
hypothesis. For Mars, only the first American fly-by
(Mariner 4) carried a magnetometer. As fundamental
a quantity as the magnetic field should be measured by
all vehicles passing close to the surface of planets.
The measurements of the Moons magnetic field are
more complete because more vehicles have gone there.
The Russian lunar impacter Luna 2 carried a magneto-
meter from which it appears that the Moons surface
magnetic field is less than 20 to 30 ~ (DOLGINOV et al.,
1961). The American orbiter Lunar Explorer 35 has
been the basis for a more sensitive upper limit to the
lunar field, namely only a few gammas (NESS, 1969).
However, the last manned vehicle on the surface of the
Moon (Apollo 12) carried a magnetometer which
measured a field of 35 y (DYAL, 1970). This field, if it is
poloidal on the scale of the entire Moon, is consistent
with Schusters hypothesis. But in that case it is in-
consistent with the lunar orbiter upper limit, 14 ?.
The various unmanned lunar landers have not trans-
ported magnetometers to the surface of the Moon.
Clearly they would have been of extraordinary value.
These two field measurements near the Moon imply
that the magnetic field measured by Apollo 12 is strictly
local, within a few hundred km of the Apollo 12 land-
ing site. This interpretation is the best one in the sense
that it accepts the deductions from observations by
both Explorer 35 and Apollo 12.
However, the interactions of the Moon with either
the solar wind or with the geomagnetic tail are not well
understood theoretically. The variable spatial and tem-
poral response to the Moon of the solar wind field and
magnetospheric tail fields are involved. Twill not review
these.
From the point of view just of Apollo 12, on the other
hand, it seems that only an extraordinary field could
manifest itself in no other outstanding selenological
features, such as surface composition or topography or
gravitational pecularities of the landing site. In any case,
the riddle of this Apollo 12 magnetometer measure-
ment can be resolved in lunar landings that carry
magnetometers to other points on the surface of the
 RELATION OF ANGULAR MOMENTUM AND MAGNETIC FIELDS 231

TABLE 1 -

Angular momentum L and magnetic dipole M for various objects

3) L/M Source for M
Object L (erg) M (G . cm
Moon 1.5 x1036 <6x102 >2.5 x1014 DOLGINOV eta!. (1961)
Mars 1.5 x iO~ <8 x 1023 >2 x 10 Mariner 4 (no magnetopause at
13000 km; B>30 ~)
Venus >8x1023 >4x1014 Mariner 5 (no magnetopause,
10000 km; B>80 7)
Earth L~=6x104 8x102 7xl014
Jupiter 4x105 4x103 1 x101 WARWICK (1963), 10 G polar field
Sun L = 1.7x1048 M 32 5x10~ 1 Gpolarfield
Ap star 102L 0 = 3.5x10 3M
0 72 5 x 10
1060 0 4x1012
I x 1014 Surface field = 2000 G
Milky
Pulsar Way
prediction: Surface4x10
field = 1013g
~) Lg,~,zy 1010(stars) x2 x 1033(g) x 1044(cm2) >< 6.28
= x ~ x 10 15(s) = 4 x l0~~
erg
Mgata,y= 106(G)x 1066(cm) 1060 G cm3.
=

Moon. This must be an urgent experimental require-
ment for the next missions.
The Moon is an important magnetic object in still
another sense. Unlike the larger planets or the stars,
the Moon is possibly or even probably solid to its core.
Hydromagnetic theory, however relevant to larger
objects in the universe, may be irrelevant to lunar
magnetic fields. Even this point could be debated, of
course. Nevertheless, it may be that the moon is as
large a thoroughly solid object as we have to deal with
in astronomy, the largest value of angular momentum
to which hydromagnetic theory is irrelevant. If so, the
moon provides the arena for a critical test of Schusters
hypothesis. The Apollo 12 field strength, taken by it-
self, confirms it for the Moon. Explorer 35 disproves it.
It appears to be too important a question than should
be answered by the complex and, if! may gauge from
the discussion between Ness and Sonnet at this sym-
posium, even controversial Explorer 35 data interpre-
tation.
In the most recent decade, magnetic fields in the
Milky Way also have been measured, by radio astro-
nomical techniques. It is possible to estimate the angu-
lar momentum of the galaxy and compare it with these
interstellar magnetic fields. Hydromagnetic convection
surely plays a critically important role in determining
the observed galactic field topology and strength.
Nevertheless the galaxy confirms the hypothesis sur-
prisingly well.
Finally, one dares to suggest that the pulsar magnetic
fields proposed by Gold and others are consistent with
Schusters hypothesis, although it should be emphasiz-
ed that these fields are by no means measured, or non-
controversial and free of interpretational bias. Pro-
phetically, Blacketts paper discusses magnetic fields of
the order ofmagnitude of 1 MG in white dwarfs. These
now appear to be eminently reasonable and essentially
confirmed in terms of present views on pulsars.
I summarize these results in table 1. For each object,
the table presents an angular momentum, a magnetic
dipole moment and a reference or rationalization of the
adopted numbers, In the case of the Moon, I have used
the upper limit field established by Luna 2 rather than
the Explorer 35 values. I derived this table in its origi-
nal form in July 1969, well before Apollo 12 measured
the lunar field. I therefore let the table stand as it was
rather than insert the Apollo 12 measurements as if
they were a poloidal field typical of the Moon at large.
The Sun presents a more difficult problem since its
surface field is the convolution of the poloidal field,
tangled by hydromagnetic convection. Should we adopt
the field of perhaps 100 G typical of the calcium net-
work (HOWARD, 1967) or should we adopt the broader
scale polar field, perhaps 1 G, measured by the classic
Babcock experiments (BABCOCK and BABCOCK, 1955)?
Until the deconvolution of the convective process is
meaningful theoretically, this sort of exercise will be
difficult to say the least. On the other hand, if we seek
(as Blackett did) only order-of-magnitude agreement
with Schusters hypothesis, then it is obvious that the
Sun agrees. The table adopts a nominal polar field
strength of 1 G.
232 JAMES W. WARWICK
In conclusion, I wish to emphasize that Schusters
hypothesis apparently is satisfied to within three
decimal orders of magnitude for objects whose mag-
netic dipoles extend over about 39 decimal orders of
magnitude. This should provide a challenge to astro-
physical theory on the origins of magnetism in rotating
bodies. Whether the challenge points toward the foun-
dations of physics or toward the more specific self-
excited dynamo theory seems unclear as of now. The
Moon appears to be the most promising place to
straighten this point out.
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