Focus Fusion Society Forum

NASA LENR Cold Fusion

2012-01-31T11:16:09Z

Hello all, I am new to the FFS forums. Currently working my way through all the posts trying to get myself up to date on everything!

A bit about me: I think that achieving net power from nuclear fusion is the most important thing that could be done at this point in time, bar none. LPP and DPF are my favourite contenders for achieving this! I am not a scientist although I wish I was. I want to see the world in a much better state than it is currently in.

Having said all of this it would seem that my first post on these forums is going to end up being slightly heretical. A friend has just sent me a youtube video from NASA which he has tracked back to their website.

In the video they claim to have ‘demonstrated ability to produce excess amounts of energy, cleanly, without hazardous ionizing radiation…’ etc.

Video: http://technologygateway.nasa.gov/media/CC/lenr/lenr.html (see 00:48)

Can anybody comment on the significance of this information or point me to anywhere it has already been discussed. Many thanks

Edit: related info link was a copy of the video link

A speculation about mass energy equivalent and frequency

2012-01-24T16:51:18Z

Thank you everyone for letting me bounce my crazy ideas off you.
Please add another contender to the craziness parade.

The mass equivalence to energy:
E=mc^2

Frequency equivalence to energy:
E=h*f (where h is plancs constant)

Can we combine into:
h*f=mc^2
f=(mc^2)/h Frequency equivalence to mass

Looking at the EM spectrum you can see that the right side cuts off at about:
10^21 hz
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:EM_Spectrum_Properties_edit.svg

I assume that beyond this point photons materialize into sub-atomic particles due to amount of energy they have.
Although I do not have enough understanding to evaluate this in the framework of quantum mechanics,
but this helped me to accept the concept that sub atomic particles are standing waves,
assuming that waves can “stop” when the reach super-high frequency.
Maybe reducing the frequency would make the waves “go” again.

So the idea is:
Make a matter to energy convertor, by reducing the frequency of standing waves (subatomic particles).
This is left as an exercise to the reader =]

Plasma focus education

2012-01-23T22:47:31Z

I have been talking to someone on the board and we started talking about the parts that make up a plasma focus and their limitations. I offered to start putting together some information on the plasma focus such as the pulse power methodology, electrode design and some of the basic plasma physics that governs the device and if there is interest, the differences between what is considered mainstream and the LPP approach. My thought was to incorporate some math which is vital to better understanding the device and the plasma inside it. My goal is to provide information on the plasma focus to help the enthusiastic person that has little background in plasma or pulse power technology.

I can start on whatever topic but I am seeking two things: level of interest and where to start.

Editorial comments would be welcome.

An example for the pulse power topic questions would be:

What is pulse power?
Why use it?
What are the components of a plasma focus?
What are typical specifications and limitations of these components?
Is there more than one way to build a plasma focus pulse power system?
Can current technology support a working Fo-Fu power plant?

Cavitation ( gamma ray production verified )

2011-09-20T17:16:09Z

I have previously suggested the deliberate use of non inertial cavitation in a plasma, pulsing the “bubble” with short bursts of highly intense lasers ( instead of acoustic fields ). I thought that the resulting collapse of the “bubble” would probably produce high energy gamma rays. I read today that this has been accomplished at the University of Strathclyde…
The experiments were carried out on the Gemini laser in the Central Laser Facility at the Science and Technology Facilities Council’s Rutherford Appleton Laboratory.
The gamma rays produced were termed “the brightest gamma rays on earth”
Here is the URL for the article : http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/09/110919113836.htm

MultiFerroic conversion of heat to electricity

2011-09-15T02:09:44Z

Flipping a “metamaterial” between phases induces current:

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/aenm.201000048/pdf

Much more effective than thermocouples, it seems.

Nuclear Fusion in China

2011-09-06T16:43:09Z

Here is a link to a web posting on fusion development in China:

http://www.21stcenturysciencetech.com/Articles_2011/Spring-2011/China_Fusion.pdf

Forgive me if this has been posted before.

DPF and muon catalysis

2011-08-22T20:09:47Z

Has anyone simulated what would happen? If you fire a stream of muons at a DPF plasmoid .. assuming you optimally timed it (I am guessing you would need to do it right before the plasmoid forms rather that during/after .. but this can be checked out) .. would the high temperature and boron (which is a heavy nucleus) itself negate the catalytic effect (I doubt it since the muon catalyzed fusion experiments have shown the muon can catalyze up to 300 d-t nuclei to fuse so taht must happen even after the temperature increases)?

Maybe the guys at RIKEN RAL can aim their muon beam at an LPP type DPF device and see what happens.

Catalyzing DPF with muons will increase the capital cost, but it might increase the yield so it may be worth it. Has anyone tried it, or does the math rule it out?

Immortality

2011-08-17T08:15:41Z

jamesr - 16 August 2011 12:01 PM

If people don’t die of cancer then what do they die of? People will still get weaker and more frail with age

I saw an interesting statistic fairly recently. The gist of it was: If we eliminated all death from all forms of disease how long would the average individual live before he/she died from an accident/murder/other trauma.

The answer was around 600 years. Hopefully we will soon be able to make those healthy productive years. I’m a fairly close follower of The Methuselah Foundation. This is a group trying to postpone or eliminate the aging process.

Somewhat off topic, but I suggest interested readers check it out.

New Scientist article: "Star power: Small fusion start-ups aim for break-even"

2011-08-16T12:03:17Z

This week’s New Scientist has a write-up on some of the other current fusion projects.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21128251.400-star-power-small-fusion-startups-aim-for-breakeven.html

No mention of DPF devices or Focus Fusion though. Are the other guys PR budgets that much bigger or is it simply a case, that LPP isn’t including magazines like New Scientist, Scientific American, Popular Mechanics, Physics World, IEEE Spectrum etc on the press releases to raise their awareness of the project.

EROI & Δt or the shared weakness of nuclear and renewable

2011-08-14T21:58:32Z

I am developing an idea and a “model” (and you could call it a hypothesis, but its much less formal at the moment) how to compare different types of energy sources from the perspective of an energy investor. Basically if you have some energy source and you want to build more of those, how would different sources compare. This comparison is similar to EROI, but tries to take capital requirement into perspective. Basically this should be best approach on deciding which energy source you want to choose considering there are time constrains, like in a real economy, so definitively you should choose the one that gives you the best ROI on the shortest of time. Thats what the Δt is for. I never heard about similar comparison before, so I am hoping the idea is original. The interesting part that when trying to play with my model (using some made-up data), I found out that both renewable and nuclear share a similar trait - such that when we factor in the Δt they don’t look so attractive, that is they both require a lot of time to pay off, and that mean a lot of capital (energy) has to be invested in advance. This insight might change when I will input actual data (considering I will find all the values), but still fossil fuels have a much shorter Δt (how fast you can get the return) and that’s a serious advantage. I am trying to include the carbon tax into equation, but it is basically a variable that equals:how much should it cost, so it would not be profitable to do this.
I will also try to calculate a yearly ROI for the energy sources in comparison, so we can see how well they do as an investment of as any investor knows a few percentages in cumulative return can be a huge difference, so I am looking for another unit to compare them instead of percentage (maybe doubling time?).