I had missed the fact that earlier this year in a response to an early version of Tajmar’s paper on the role of helium (see June 23 entry), Jochim Hauser and Walter Droscher suggested that there are no major friction effects with helium. Since the effect is not due to the mechanical friction of rotating gases the authors suggest Tajmar’s anomalous effect must be due to other mechanisms.

They go on to say that since symmetry breaking is required for the production of gravitophotons, yet the Tajmar’s effect occurs at temperatures higher than required for Cooper-pair formation, it is likely not the Cooper-pair bosons that produce the symmetry breaking.

This brings into the mix the possibility that a yet unidentified symmetry breaking mechanism far above superconducting temperatures may be sufficient to produce Tajmar’s results (see note from the Editor near the bottom of the April 14 Blog entry).