Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

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Quantum
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Quantum »

Edward, I'm not disagreeing with you in principle.

The number of fusion events a single muon can catalyze is obviously debatable.

I was merely suggesting that no-one can say definitively that they don't play some part in fusion in the sun.

While I'm not saying no fusion would occur without muons, We have no way of proving that they don't play a part in some of the fusion that occurs.

It is, after all, accepted that the presence of muons will increase the rate of fusion. (increase the fusion cross section)
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Quantum »

Chris, surely a 'muon atom' has a much greater fusion cross section in any scenario?
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Chris Bradley
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Chris Bradley »

I've no idea what you're talking about. How does that relate to muon fusion? The muon acts as the 'nucleus' to two fusible nucleii, thus keeps them hovering around real-close-like in a 'quantum space', whereas 'fusion cross-section' relates to two fast-moving fusible nucleii on a beam-collision trajectory.
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Quantum »

OL, Chris.....In layman's terms, muons act as catatysts, thereby effectively increasing the fusion cross section, or, at least, they 'increase the probability' of a 'fusion event' occuring.
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Chris Bradley
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Chris Bradley »

Ash Small wrote:
> OL, Chris.....In layman's terms, muons act as catatysts, thereby effectively increasing the fusion cross section, or, at least, they 'increase the probability' of a 'fusion event' occuring.

Give it me in specialist's terms as best you can, as I am unclear what level of understanding of muon catalysed fusion you have and this makes the discussion difficult to know where to begin it. What do *you* mean by 'fusion cross-section' in respect of a muon-atom, and if the probability of fusion is increased, with respect to the probability of -what- is it increased?
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Quantum »

Let me sleep on it, Chris, and I'll do my best to answer your question tomorrow......

At the end of the day, I'm but a mere metal worker.....
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Quantum »

Chris,

'the concept of a cross section is used to express the likelihood of interaction between particles.'

If something increases the likelihood of fusion occuring, it increases the fusion cross section.

This is my understanding, it is also 'backed up' by wikipedia.
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Chris Bradley
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Chris Bradley »

Not really. Cross-section only applies in respect of a probability of interaction where you have a populated medium in which free particles are moving as an 'emsemble' system. What is the density of orbiting deuterons in a muon-atom? It doesn't make sense in that context.

Fusion occurs in muon atoms due to a confined quantised space such that the wave function of those orbiting deuterons/tritons causes them to, potentially, 'occupy the same space' and thus fuse. This is opposed to fusion of free particles in motion [thermal or individually accelerated] in which there is a quantum probability that they actually exist at some distributed region of space (according to their relative de Broglie wavelength) such that they might spontaneously find themselves 'in the same region of space' and thus fuse.

Whether you wish to assign 'nominal' velocities and densities of the orbiting deuterons/tritons, so as to force fit the situation to match the free nucleii scenario, is your choice but I think it'll end up in confusion and tears if you try to make predictions with that notion.
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Quantum »

You are correct in as much as muon catalised fusion experiments use liquid D and T, so the nuclei are closer together, but gravity will achieve a similar result in the sun.

All I'm saying is 'How do we know there aren't any muons in the sun?'
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Chris Bradley
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Chris Bradley »

Ash Small wrote:
> All I'm saying is 'How do we know there aren't any muons in the sun?'

Because the Sun has too much plasma mass for heavy charged particles like muons, or fast cosmic protons that tend to form them, for it to be penetrated, and that the most energetic reaction (in our p-p burning Sun) is a 5MeV gamma from the D+p reaction (that almost immediately follows a successful pp fusion) yet over 100MeV is needed to form a muon, hence there are no reactions known of that have sufficient energy to form muons in the Sun.
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Quantum »

Muons are formed by collisions between hadrons, (protons hitting nuclei in the case of cosmic ray produced muons).

Presumably muons can be formed by collisions between protons if their energy is high enough.

Surely there are protons in the sun with sufficient energy?

(That's where cosmic rays come from)
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Chris Bradley
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Chris Bradley »

Nope. None*. It's way too cold.

*(excepting for the 'theoretical' 1 in 10^100-type tail end of the thermal distribution, whose probability works out as units of occurrences. I've not crunched the numbers, I could be out by 50 orders of magnitude, but it makes no odds. Effectively none.)
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Quantum »

Then how are 100 MeV protons (cosmic rays) produced?
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Chris Bradley »

When God flushes his bog, or something similar...

There's more we don't know about the rest of the Universe than we do. Supernova and huge gamma emitting sources are likely 'starting points' for that amount of energy. Black-holes or, if you don't believe in such things, at least highly dense neutron stars and rapid quasars with 'trans-luminal' rotating magnetic fields, &c., &c. The mind boggles. There are inordinate numbers of TeV protons hitting the earth continuously, let alone MeV protons.

The Sun is a comparative fridge compared with the ovens and fireworks in other parts of the Universe.

The fission of the larger nuclear masses (so formed in such events) produce such levels of energy so muons can actually be observed here on earth even by 'natural' sources. Of course, we've got accelerators to generate particles of such energy.
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Quantum »

OK, Chris, so hadrons in the sun don't have sufficient energy to produce pions or muons. (at least not in sufficient numbers to influence the rate of fusion)
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Chris Bradley
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Chris Bradley »

yes, that is my understanding of it.
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Quantum »

Thanks for answering my question, Chris.
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Chris64Strev »

The concept is interesting. I think the theoretician thought pressure alone would get a reaction but the mentioned experiment disproved that. I understand a 600 Km Sphere of gaseous Deuterium will spontaneously light up like a star and atmospheric temperature and pressure.

I find the idea of D+D>He4 very interesting. But how would the energy of reaction be released? I suggest a 3 body collision would result in the third body carrying off the energy thereby being a catalyst.

I therefore suggest the use of a P + D mixture so the proton would be the catalyst. Since you would not need many protons a normal bottle of low grade laboratory deuterium would contain sufficient number of protons to be a catalyst.

The reaction would be second order wrt D so the reaction rate would be proportional to the square of the deuterium pressure.

The rate would also go up exponentially with temperature but if you use deuterons accelerated by electric fields the reaction rate goes up linearly with the energy of collision.

The probability of a three body collision depends on the product of the pressure of each of the components so in this model three D collisions are more likely than D+D+P. To make the latter more likely a higher pressure of P is required, Higher that the D pressure. I suggest a protium pressure of three times the deuterium pressure.

The four proton interaction would be proportional to the fouth power of the protium pressure and becomes important at collision energies of 17 KeV. This condition can easily be met with normal electric fields.

I suggest therefore that the fusor be folded so the ion travels in a curved path so high energies may be reached with small containers. A magneric field will curve the ion path.

The condition collision energy=mean free path x field strength means there is a trade off between pressure and electric field strength.

This trade off means that to obtain high collision energy low pressure is needed, but this means there will be a low reaction rate.

The power to generate the electric field depends on the field strength and the energy generated by fusion depends on the fourth power of the proton pressure so there will be an optimum pressure for each field strength.

To obtain the condition energy generated = exciter power (ignition) we need to plot a graph of electric power against pressure for collision energy of 17 KeV and a graph of power generated by the volume of the reaction against pressure at 17 KeV. Where the two graphs intesect is the ignition point.

For deuterium I make this 10^-4Tor at 10 watt but for hydrogen 1000 Tor at 100 MWatt.

Chris.
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Chris Bradley
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Chris Bradley »

What are you blithering on about??

Anyone who stumbles on this site might actually read this as a set of some sort facts.

It's bloomin' guesswork, misunderstandings and nonsense that's "not even wrong". Don't try to write about something you clearly know nothing. It's claptrap of the first order.
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by djolds1 »

Richard Hull wrote:We have been over muon catalyized fusion to distraction! It is perhaps a close brother to the forlorn hope of P-B11 fusion in these forums.

As earth based muons demand a minimum of 50mev to be produced, or more likely 100mev to be produced readily, any fusion efforts involving them by man would require extreme input energy expenditures.

Finally, there are no indications of any feasibility of this idea as a net power producing system. Certainly, no one here will ever investigate it.

Richard Hull
Feasibility is now easier to assess. There's a patent on the idea, with a test-stand variant:

http://www.google.com/patents/US20130235963

Fuel LiD of the specified density.

And interestingly, Williams hypothesizes that the proton is a composite particle as well - two positrons in orbit of an electron. Neatly accounts for where all that antimatter from the early universe went.
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Richard Hull »

Inspite of all the above, my original ancient points were thinking points and not dogmatic. The proton seems to be the only intra-nuclear particle that is stable. Naturally the extra-nuclear electron is also stable. All other "condensates" that fly out of horribly energetic nuclear events are ephemeral and the supposed real particles are themselve merely ephemera from a long gone age in this universe where they condensed out as the creational energy densities evolved downward in the expanding universe. This includes the Bosons and Quarks which had their time or age and then the age of the mesons on to the age of the neutron and finally, the current age of bulk atomic matter. As we are between ice ages on earth, so the neutron maybe as well. It is a moderately stable piece of condensed matter when outside the nucleus, but its age is ending such that its half life is short by our sense of time but quite comprehensible and long enough to be usable as a free particle. Mesons are the next long lived microsecond life span particles created at 100mev + events of terror upon the nucleus and so on.

We only get quarks and bosons when we create instantaneous, local, sub nuclear energy densities that drive the current nucleus for pico and fempto seconds back to some ancient age where the bosons and quarks were stable. Then, the present day, cold, universe squelches them from existence. Thus, the quarks are not part of matter anymore than are mesons or perhaps even neutrons. They are what matter was! The neutron decays in minutes to real matter, just as most mesons do. As the neutron age, effectively ended, there were only protons and electrons. Thus, hydrogen formed and gravity could help it fuse and coloumbic forces could steer charged particles about at close range. Such forces did not exist early on, allowing the original expansion to get beyond such intereferences until the expansion cool-down allowed the condesations to begin and forces to slowly accumulate in evermore complex forms of matter.

Only the energy densities found in the nucleus of this current age allow the neutron to condense at relatively low energies from the nucleus to decay into two truly, fully stable chunks of matter....( Proton and electron - stable at 3 kelvins.) The heaviest elements are divesting themselves of neutrons as the universe's neutron age is still, yet closing. Only super nova and greater events can create the heaviest of elements. Thus, there are pockets of energy, however brief that can make neutrons so long as what we call the neutron can be packaged in heavy matter nuclei.

Does the neutron really exist in the nucleus? Probably about as much as the proton and electron exist in the free neutron. For sure there are no Quarks or Bosons in the nucleus and maybe, just maybe, no neutrons. Yes, these little fempto second pieces of high energy garbage might be the source of mass, charge gravity, etc., but they are are not part of the nucleus they are what condensed into and created the finished wad of matter that we call the nucleus at 3 kelvins.

Thus, for me, all the tiny sub-atomic particle zoo really has, in effect, no real existence. All the energies, forces, masses that we are aware of are the result of their condensation in a naturally decending order into something that is no longer them at all, but something that we call the atomic nucleus. Any discussion of extra dimensions, strings and such are about as viable and realistic to me as talk about bosons, quarks, mesons, etc. This is my take on things.

P.S. The source of gravity?.......For me gravity is sourced in the smallest particle that can be proven beyond all doubt not to fall in a gravitational field. The free neutron definitely falls in a gravitational field. Do mesons? Source of charge and thereby magnetism?....For me the first matter particle identified with no charged bretheren and which will not respond to any magnetic forces.

Richard Hull
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Chris Bradley
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Chris Bradley »

Richard Hull wrote: As we are between ice ages on earth
Just to clarify one common misunderstanding that abounds - we ARE in an ice age. An ice age is a period in which surface ice remains at the poles throughout the year. In the history of the earth, ice at the poles is uncommon. Perrenial polar surface ice is the exception, not the norm. We are currently in an interglacial period, where the edge of the ice caps grow and recede. 'Glacial cycles', which we are currently between, are often confused with 'ice ages'.

We are now in what is called the pleistocene glaciation, but in an interglacial period within that ice age, in which the ice caps recede. During such periods, unstable weather systems dominate. There always have been, and always will be, unstable weather systems during interglacials. One 'minute' [on a geological scale] it's hot, the next it's cold.

Previous glaciations have lasted between 30 and 300 million years. The pleistocene glaciation we're in now started around 3 million years ago. So, geology says we're right at the beginning of this glaciation ... it's gonna get very cold the next time the ice sheets advance, and it is an assured geological fact that they will!

In the earth's ~4 billion year life, perennial polar ice has been present for only some 600 M years of that (~15%).

Sorry for the 'off topic', but these teeny little scientific facts never seem to get a proper airing when 'climate change' gets discussed, and I feel these things should be common education so folks can put odd notions hinting at expectations of 'climate stability' into perspective. Of course the ice caps are receding, either that or they are advancing. It's always one or the other during an ice age!
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by swamijake »

"Previous glaciations have lasted between 30 and 300 million years. The pleistocene glaciation we're in now started around 3 million years ago. So, geology says we're right at the beginning of this glaciation ... it's gonna get very cold the next time the ice sheets advance, and it is an assured geological fact that they will!"

Previous glaciations did not include a species digging billions of tons of carbon out of the ground and putting it in the air. Using one part of a past record to predict the future, especially with a system as complex as global climate, might be oversimplifying the situation.
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Chris Bradley
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Re: Interesting Alternate Fusion Concept

Post by Chris Bradley »

swamijake wrote:Previous glaciations did not include a species digging billions of tons of carbon out of the ground and putting it in the air.
Well, not that I'm big on my geology, I am sure I may be corrected, but AFAIK there may not have been species doing this but during the cryogenian glaciations the hypothesised super continent 'Rodinia' started to fragment into rifts and basalt melt plateaus, with one being some 1,500 miles across, which'd have released 10's of trillions of tons of CO2 (humans will reach around one trillion tons by 2040, at current projections). Didn't seem to stop the Marinoan glaciation. There has been glaciations still when CO2 levels are in the 10,000's or 1,000's of ppm CO2, rather than 100's.

Not that I would want to get into a long debate about climate change, I've no particular opinion one way or the other, I'm just stating as a fact that there will be further glaciation periods. Fossil fuel use will have died out in 500 years time, either because it is no longer accessible or we've moved on to better things. Either way, we are like ants on the back of an elephant, and we may well believe that all our frantic activity is what has stopped the elephant in his tracks to rub his back on a tree, and it may even be true, but ultimately we will be a brief and virtually insignificant historic episode in this planet's life. The earth is oblivious to us, and the flora and fauna will continue to evolve long after our brief presidency of this planet. There is no 'save the earth', there is only 'save the humans'!

On a far more interesting note relevant to the forum: As far as I understand it, which admittedly is not a very great deal having only just been reading up on how CO2 may be ascertained in the neoprotezoic period of the cryogenian glaciation, the history of oceanic CO2 levels back then is generally by boron isotope differentiation (boron compound find their way into marine carbonates, which are then subducted and re-emerge on the surface in the subduction zones in magma melts and hydrous fluids). Apparently, surface crust boron is depleted in boron 11, while the oceanic crusts are enriched. The geologists apparently put this down to weathering processes, so that boron/carbon bearing minerals that show 11B enrichment in common with oceanic crust are regarded as records of the oceanic environment.

So I wasn't aware of this, that surface boron is 10B enriched compared with oceanic boron, and I'd be happy to hear from anyone else with some better knowledge of this. However, it would seem to me that if this was a weathering process, as the geologists appear to think, that isotope kinetics would tend to favour the 10B would be depleted and the 11B left on the surface. So perhaps the alternative explanation for the surface enrichment of 10B is because of cosmogenic neutrons being absorbed by the 11B in the more-exposed surface crust, thereafter disappearing as 4He, while this wouldn't happen in the oceanic crust way below a thick layer of water? Of course, this would be a truly slow process of 'geologically' slow rates, but we are talking geological time-scales!
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