Abstract

Findings show that the rays of star light are lensed primarily in the plasma rim of the sun and hardly in the vacuum space just slightly above the rim. The thin plasma atmosphere of the sun represents a clear example of an indirect interaction involving an interfering plasma medium between the gravitational field of the sun and the rays of light from the stars.  Since the lower boundary of this vacuum space is only a fraction of a solar radius above the solar plasma rim, it is exposed to virtually the same gravitational field. The thin plasma atmosphere of the sun appears to represent an indirect interaction involving an interfering plasma medium between the gravitational field of the sun and the rays of star light. An application of Gauss' law clearly shows that, if the light bending rule of General Relativity were valid, then a light bending effect due to the gravitational field of the sun should be easily detectable with current technical mean in Astrophysics at analytical Gaussian spherical surfaces of several solar radii. More importantly, the very same light bending equation obtained by General Relativity was derived from classical assumptions of a minimum energy path of a light ray in the plasma rim, exposed to the gravitational gradient field of the sun. An intense search of the star filled skies reveals a clear lack of lensing among the countless numbers of stars, where there are many candidates for gravitational lensing according to the assumptions of General Relativity. Assuming the validity of the light bending rule of General Relativity, the sky should be filled with images of Einstein rings. Moreover, events taking place at the center of our galaxy, a region known as Sagittarius A*, thought to contain a super massive black hole, is considered a most likely candidate for an observation of gravitational lensing. A lack of evidence for gravitational lensing is clearly revealed in the time resolved images of the rapidly moving stellar objects orbiting about Sagittarius A*.