Wednesday, April 3, 2002

I would like to tell you what I know about Dr. Paulo Correa and his partner and wife Alexandra, two people who have recently done something marvelous. What they have done is to make a series of startling discoveries in basic science - beginning with their work in plasma physics, a field that is almost certainly going to have a major impact on our world in the near future. The Correas have now convincingly demonstrated the principle that it is possible to release from charged metals in a vacuum amounts of free energy which exceed the amounts of energy put into the system.

Since I am not trained in this field, I will not be able to discuss the scientific details of the Correas' discoveries. However, what I would like to say should speak to what the experience and achievements of the Correas can teach us about the way science happens, what can happen to scientists, and why it matters.

I have known Paulo Correa for more than twenty years, first during his development as my graduate student, then as a biomedical scientist and partner, and over these many years, as a close friend. I can therefore claim to know him very well, giving me at least some of the qualifications required to be able to write about him. And I can also tell you a little about the work we have done together at the University of Toronto.

Our friendship is, I believe, unique. We listen to one another, we trust one another, and we can even criticize one another without fear. We seek and give each other advice without risking the other's ire. We can rev up each other's intellectual motors, and we can build on each other's ideas.

Perhaps our most exciting time in the laboratory came when Paulo and I were confronted with a contradiction that existed in the biomedical literature. It arose out of studies on patients with the chronic myeloproliferative disorder Polycythemia vera (PV), a potentially lethal condition of unknown cause in which a major increase in number of circulating red blood cells occurs. In such patients, the question arose 'Are the progenitors of the red blood cells entirely independent of the growth factor that normally regulates the numbers of these cells, or are the progenitor cells in this disorder overly sensitive to the action of the growth factor?' Opposite answers to this question appeared in publications from different laboratories. Experiments of this kind were all carried out on cells in culture, and it became evident to us that the question could not be resolved as long as research on the problem had to be carried out in culture media that contained serum. Serum is an extremely complex fluid that contains both known and undefined growth factors which can dramatically affect red blood cell production. Paulo and I tackled this problem by first devising a cell culture medium that did not contain serum and so was free of these growth factors. Cells in this medium remained alive but did not grow to form colonies unless growth factor was added. Now experiments could be done against a clean background. We first investigated the responses of PV and normal progenitor cells to different quantities of the growth factor that was known to be the one that regulates red blood cell production in the normal adult, ie erythropoietin (Epo). Surprisingly, we found that the sensitivities of PV and normal progenitor cells to Epo were identical. The PV progenitor cells were found to be much more sensitive than normal to another growth factor, Insulin- like growth factor-1 or IGF-1, the factor that regulates red blood cell production in the fetus!

Obviously, the critical entity that permitted these findings to be made was the serum-free medium we had devised. We patented this medium in the US and in Canada.

As far back as I have known him, Paulo Correa was unafraid to challenge his professors if he thought they were wrong, no matter what the consequences. He is a biomedical scientist who, after contributing to the field of fundamental cell biology, rather than becoming someone else's postdoctoral student, set up an independent laboratory (under the company name Labofex) together with Alexandra, where they have now worked for the past 15 years. At the same time as they pursued full-time research careers in this laboratory without benefit of grants, they wrote music, poetry, painted, and invested money in the stock market with some failures but also with some striking successes that have provided a living for the two of them and the capital and maintenance costs of a first class biophysics laboratory. From early on I have called Paulo my Renaissance Man.

The work of the Correas began with an investigation of the pulsed abnormal glow discharge that occurs during electron emission from a cold cathode in a vacuum. At Labofex, the Correas pursued an experimental investigation of the electrodynamics of anomalous cathode reaction forces made manifest when the abnormal glow discharge was conditioned to pulsate autogenously. External pulsation of the abnormal glow had been previously investigated by Ernesto Manuel, who obtained the 1969 patent for the method used to this day in the plastic coating of softdrink cans! But the Correas discovered that, under defined physical conditions, the abnormal glow could be made to pulsate 'autogenously' by field emission. Anomalous cathode reaction forces developed by field emission in vacuum-arc discharges had been well known to physicists since the 1930's, and had led Dr. Harold Aspden of Southampton University, UK, in 1969 to enunciate his principle of an anomalous energy transfer in plasma between electrons and heavy ions, resulting in a vacuum-induced acceleration of electron flow and a progressive increase in electric current. Dr. Aspden had predicted that in such discharge tubes, the current would increase without limit for a constant applied voltage, and the tube would be destroyed unless some means were taken to limit the current. Previous electrodynamic experiments of this type in the US and in Russia had ended in failure, apparently because of electrode burn-out.

Alexandra Correa is an expert glassblower whose knowledge and skills were essential for designing the special vacuum tubes in which the autogenously pulsed abnormal glow discharges took place and on which the early experiments depended. It was during this phase of the work that her expert knowledge of vacuum design overcame the obstacles arising from the excessive heat generated in these systems and which made possible detailed studies on the pulsed abnormal glow discharge (PAGD).

But plasma physics was not destined to be the pathway along which the Correa research proceeded. The stimulus for that came from an entirely different direction. Aspden's 1969 Law of Electrodynamics had already fully accounted for the anomalous phenomenon of cathode reaction forces observed in field emission, and had shown that the interaction was affected by the ratio of masses of the charge carriers. In fact, the Correas seem to have been pushed into their current theoretical and experimental work by a variety of observations about electrodynamic interactions which, instead of involving monopolar massbound charges - such as electrons and heavy ions - implicated 'neutral' or ambipolar charges that were devoid of inertia; the energy involved was therefore mass-free. During this phase of their work, conducted at a second laboratory that they set up for this purpose (the Aurora Biophysics Research Institute, ABRI), they were greatly inspired by their systematic and critical reading of the works of Tesla and Reich. This led them to a mathematical and physical reexamination of electrodynamic interactions by a different approach and from a completely different point of view. The beginning point of this new approach was an investigation of the hitherto unexplained anomalous arrest of electroscopic discharges under a variety of well-defined conditions. And by the time they completed this phase of their work, they had discovered a method for magnifying mass- free electric radiation in excess of the massbound electric power that it consumed. Eventually, when they extended this knowledge to an understanding of nonelectric interactions of mass-free energy, they rediscovered the principles behind the elusive 'Orgone Motor' of Dr. Wilhelm Reich, and improved upon it to devise what they designate as the 'Aether Motor'.

One day, Barbara, my wife, and I witnessed a demonstration by Paulo and Alexandra Correa of this 'Aether Motor' - it was an electrical generating system that could deliver electrical power without any external power input save its connections to two 'orgone accumulator' boxes or to either our insulated bodies or a ground pipe. Since the device moved a motor and drove a circuitry, it had to consume some power; this appears to have been provided by the environment. The event occurred with incredible calm - no explosion, no noise even, no sudden heat, no bright light, just the quiet pulsation of a discharge tube and a quiet turning of a small rotor. Save for the driving of the motor from contact with our bodies, the effect was almost disappointingly banal. It has not always been that way. There were occasions during the evolution of these discoveries when accidental electrical discharges did threaten the lives of our intrepid pair. Fortunately, these accidents never deterred them.

The realization of what we were looking at was mind-boggling. Here before our eyes was what I was brought up to believe to be absolutely impossible! The implications were also enormous - a world of literally free energy without pollution by a 'product readily producible by available equipment and processes at a cost that allows mass marketing for multiple applications'. You would have expected a scene like a Boxing Day Sale in Toronto. But nothing like that happened. Why? I have given a lot of thought to that question.

When an investigator presents the scientific community with a concept that challenges previous beliefs, there follows a series of stereotyped responses: 'He (or she) is wrong.' 'He can't be right because it goes against what has long been accepted as true by everyone.' 'He is self-deluded but wants so desperately for his concept to be widely accepted that he unconsciously selects the data that fit and rejects the data that don't,' or - 'He's lying!' Or 'This isn't even his field, what right does he have to challenge the work of many years by highly trained experts?' Or 'He doesn't work out of a renowned university or institute or major company. How could he be doing anything like what he claims to be so important?' Or 'If we support a thing like this and it turns out to be a fraud, we'll have wasted our company's money and we'll be considered fools.'

Once all of these responses have been uttered and evidence overwhelmingly shows each to be unable to account for what is actually being seen, then it is time for a paradigm shift. I believe that this is what has been happening in the case of Paulo and Alexandra Correa.

The Internet is, in my opinion, the perfect medium for explorers like the Correas. It gets around any of the pettiness, the timidity, the ignorance, the lack of vision, the stupidity, the arrogance, the jealousy, the automatic negativity, the suspicion, or the dishonesty of some referees in the peer review system as it exists today. At the same time, the absence of a peer review system would be fraught with the danger of biases invisible to the scientists themselves; it thus places an enormous responsibility for integrity on them. Here the Correas shine.

And gradually, referees will emerge with the necessary qualities who can assess the work fairly no matter how blatantly it challenges the existing paradigm. In the case of the Correas, this is already happening. Dr. Harold Aspden is one such referee. Likewise, the presentation of the Correas' work on glow discharges written by the retired RCA engineer Mike Carrell - who visited the Correas' laboratory - or the more recent testimonials of Mr. Uri Soudak, previously at Israeli Aircraft Industries, and of Dr. Eugene Mallove, editor of the journal Infinite Energy, on the subject of the 'Aether Motor' and their other technologies, constitute referee opinions. The same applies to the recent reflections on plasma discharges by William Tiller, Emeritus Professor at Stanford University - which Akronos Publishing has posted at its website.

The opinion put forth by Aspden - whom Paulo regards as a mentor - is of particular interest to me because, on theoretical grounds alone, he had postulated the existence of 'over-unity energy generation' as far back as 1966. He now writes: "Suffice it to say that the apparatus uses the pulsed abnormal glow of a discharge tube', which, as physicists well know, has a negative resistance characteristic. What physicists have not appreciated, until this Correa disclosure, was the real possibility or the knowledge of precisely how to go about extracting 'free' energy by exciting self-sustaining oscillations in the plasma discharge. Undoubtedly, Dr. Correa's Labofex facility in Canada will have mustered a great deal of know-how from research on this project and we will hear more as that work comes to commercial fruition". These were good tidings indeed.

Much of the difficulty with this entire subject rests in the question: "Where does this mysterious energy come from?" Dr. Aspden had suggested that the ultimate origin of this energy may well be the 'vacuum energy' of space. Says he, "So now we are confronted with the Canadian breakthrough... I really believe that, after 30 years, the link between 'free energy' and gravitation is now emerging. Meanwhile, however, let us focus on the primary task of exploiting the new energy resource."

I have recently read the letter to the Correas by Dr. Eugene Mallove, and I was overwhelmed by it. We had been only partially aware of what we were seeing when visiting the Correa laboratory and witnessing their demonstration, but Mallove's letter brought it into strong relief for us. The letter he wrote was honest, detailed, full of clear memories of what he had seen and what it meant, and especially of its long-term significance and value. He was at the same time realistic about what its impact would be and the resistance to it, and he obviously cared. In an editorial, he wrote: "The discovery by the Correas is an amazing achievement: to have isolated a regime of self-oscillating electrical plasma discharge that produces electrical energy directly, with no intermediate thermal conversion step, is a wonder."

The Correas had set out with a careful critique of the present status of their field, discovered inconsistencies, set about to find the reasons for the inconsistencies, and used this information to build an internally consistent intellectual framework, designed tests of its integrity, and applied it to achieve successful demonstrations of its validity. Without being an expert in the field, I am able to see and appreciate the broad outlines of how they approach problems, what they are trying to do, and what they have succeeded in doing.

Overcoming obstacles was not foreign to the Correas, whether they were dealing with a stubborn, unyielding, mysterious Nature, unwilling to part with its secrets without exacting very high prices for them, both figuratively and literally, or in their interactions with interested but exploitative observers intent on taking advantage of their discoveries.

Despite all the exciting developments, however, money to commercialize these discoveries has not been forthcoming from anywhere. This has not been for lack of trying by the Correas, nor for lack of interest by potential backers. Many have come to them from all over the world and have seen striking demonstrations of the XS NRG^TM PAGD reactor, the motors it drives and the batteries it charges, or of the Aether Motor developed at ABRI. These inventions are solidly protected by world patents. They are extensively documented in the patents themselves and recently on the Internet. Nevertheless, the Correas are, at the present time, in the process of shutting down their laboratory for lack of funds.

Arthur A. Axelrad
MD, PhD, FRSC, Emeritus University Professor
University of Toronto
http://medbio.utoronto.ca/faculty/axelrad.html