--- quoting Experiment Creates Nuclear Fusion in Lab AP - Thu
Apr 28, 8:31 AM ET

By ALICIA CHANG, AP Science Writer 1 minute ago

LOS ANGELES - A tabletop experiment created
nuclear
fusion — long seen as a possible clean energy
solution
— under lab conditions, scientists reported. But
the
amount of energy produced was too little to be
seen as
a breakthrough in solving the world's energy
needs.

For years, scientists have sought to harness
controllable nuclear fusion, the same power that
lights the sun and stars. This latest experiment
relied on a tiny crystal to generate a strong
electric
field. While falling short as a way to produce
energy,
the method could have potential uses in the
oil-drilling industry and homeland security, said
Seth
Putterman, one of the physicists who did the
experiment at the University of California, Los
Angeles.

The experiment's results appear in Thursday's
issue of
the journal Nature.

(snip)

"This doesn't have any controversy in it because
they're using a tried and true method," said David

Ruzic, professor of nuclear and plasma engineering
at
the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
"There's no mystery in terms of the physics."

Fusion power has been touted as the ultimate
energy
source and a cleaner alternative to fossil fuels
like
coal and oil. Fossil fuels are expected to run
short
in about 50 years.

(snip)

In the UCLA experiment, scientists placed a tiny
crystal that can generate a strong electric field
into
a vacuum chamber filled with deuterium gas, a form
of
hydrogen capable of fusion. Then the researchers
activated the crystal by heating it.

The resulting electric field created a beam of
charged
deuterium atoms that struck a nearby target, which
was
embedded with yet more deuterium. When some of the

deuterium atoms in the beam collided with their
counterparts in the target, they fused.

The reaction gave off an isotope of helium along
with
subatomic particles known as neutrons, a
characteristic of fusion. The experiment did not,
however, produce more energy than the amount put
in —
an achievement that would be a huge breakthrough.

Commercial neutron generators work in a similar
way.
But the UCLA instrument was "remarkably low-tech"
in
comparison, Michael Saltmarsh, a retired physicist

from the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in
Tennessee,
wrote in an accompanying article.

UCLA's Putterman said future experiments will
focus on
refining the technique for potential commercial
uses,
including designing portable neutron generators
that
could be used for oil well drilling or scanning
luggage and cargo at airports.

--- end quoting Experiment Creates Nuclear Fusion in Lab AP - Thu
Apr 28, 8:31 AM ET

I think the greatest advance of the above experiment is not going to be
portable neutron generators or for oil mining etc etc.

I think the greatest advance of the above is in the proving of the
Fusion Barrier Principle that no machine will ever surpass 2/3
Breakeven.

Nagamine in Oxford England set up a machine experiment with muon fusion
and he reached the Barrier Principle that controlled fusion will not
surpass 2/3 breakeven.

If the Fusion BArrier Principle is correct then all controlled machines
have the possibility of reaching 2/3 breakeven but none of them will
surpass the 2/3 mark, or 66% breakeven. The JET tokamak in Europe
reached 64% breakeven. So when they build ITER, if they ever do, then
ITER can only up JET by 2 percentage points to 66% breakeven.

I am hoping that the Putterman experiment can be a new and added means
of checking the Fusion BArrier Principle in that his experiment is
easier to scale up and to clearly show that his devise, like Nagamine is
stopped at 2/3 breakeven.

So the greatest use of the Putterman devise/experiment will be the added
confirmation of the existence of the Fusion Barrier Principle and that
no controlled fusion machine can surpass 2/3 breakeven.

Archimedes Plutonium
www.iw.net/~a_plutonium
whole entire Universe is just one big atom where dots
of the electron-dot-cloud are galaxies

Thu, 28 Apr 2005 13:42:12 -0500 Archimedes Plutonium wrote:
(snipped)


If the Fusion BArrier Principle is correct then all controlled machines
have the possibility of reaching 2/3 breakeven but none of them will
surpass the 2/3 mark, or 66% breakeven. The JET tokamak in Europe
reached 64% breakeven. So when they build ITER, if they ever do, then
ITER can only up JET by 2 percentage points to 66% breakeven.

I am hoping that the Putterman experiment can be a new and added means
of checking the Fusion BArrier Principle in that his experiment is
easier to scale up and to clearly show that his devise, like Nagamine is
stopped at 2/3 breakeven.

Most internal combustion engines have about a 30% efficiency. It is
impossible to reach 100% efficiency because the exhaust is always hotter
than the input.

Impossible. And likewise for Fusion Barrier Principle in the proof of FBP
is that the maximum enclosing of sphere into cylinder or cylinder into
sphere is 2/3 volume or 2/3 surface area, where in fusion it is the Coulomb
Law (sphere) to Faraday's Law (cylinder). Impossible for any fusion device
to surpass 2/3 breakeven and impossible for any internal combustion engine
to reach 100% efficiency.

Fusion Barrier Priniciple is related to Efficiency Principle of Internal
Combustion Engines.

There are many internal combustion engines and a wide range of efficiencies
but most are about 30% efficient. There are a wide range of Fusion
machines. The laser machines are lucky to reach 1% breakeven. JET reached
64% breakeven and Nagamine muon catalyzed fusion reached 66% breakeven.

Now where does the Putterman machine perform in terms of breakeven??

I think one of these days we will have a machine that shows clearly the 2/3
breakeven mark that is impossible to surpass. I am hoping it is the
Putterman desktop machine because of its ease to build and ease to get data
and results. Although the Nagamine muon machine costs only in the millions
to operate there maybe more ease and control in the Putterman machine
consisting of a crystal to generate a field to collide deuterium into other
deuterium.

It is not important that the Putterman machine comes close to the 2/3
breakeven but rather instead shows us, and indicates to us that it is
impossible for the crystal fusion to surpass 2/3 breakeven.

With the Nagamine muon fusion, they are looking for a "new trick" to try to
boost the 2/3 breakeven and the muon as a particle is cloaked in mystery.
But nothing in the Putterman machine is cloaked in mystery and so I am
hoping that the 2/3 breakeven barrier is easy to spot, easy to see, easy to
understand and easy to prove that Nature has this impossibility barrier.

Archimedes Plutonium
www.iw.net/~a_plutonium
whole entire Universe is just one big atom where dots
of the electron-dot-cloud are galaxies

Sun, 01 May 2005 13:28:11 -0500 Archimedes Plutonium wrote:
(snipped)


Impossible. And likewise for Fusion Barrier Principle in the proof of FBP
is that the maximum enclosing of sphere into cylinder or cylinder into
sphere is 2/3 volume or 2/3 surface area, where in fusion it is the Coulomb
Law (sphere) to Faraday's Law (cylinder). Impossible for any fusion device
to surpass 2/3 breakeven and impossible for any internal combustion engine
to reach 100% efficiency.

Fusion Barrier Priniciple is related to Efficiency Principle of Internal
Combustion Engines.


So, all I really need to do is to show how in the Carnot cycle of efficiency
of internal-combustion engine, that of (T1-T2)/T1 translates into that of
Coulomb Law (spheres) enclosed/enclosing Faraday's Law (cylinders). Can I show
that Carnot cycle is Coulomb's Law and Faraday's Law. Not as easy as it
sounds.

But when I do that, I will have unified Thermodynamics to that of EM theory or
Maxwell theory. And when I do that I will have used Thermodynamics to prove
the Fusion BArrier Principle. Thermodynamics of the impossibility of reaching
100% efficiency and Nuclear Fusion of the impossibility of surpassing 2/3
Breakeven.

Note that in Thermodynamics the impossibility is that of reaching whereas in
Nuclear Fusion the impossibility is that of surpassing, so that in nuclear
fusion it can reach 2/3 Breakeven but not surpass it. Which means these two
principles are not equivalent principles but rather instead distinct.

But both principles reduce ultimately to the Unification force of physics
which is the Coulomb Law. So Thermodynamics is ultimately reducible to the
Maxwell theory. In the Fusion Barrier Principle I believe, not sure, that the
Coulomb Law is working with the Faraday Law but it may also be the
Ampere-Maxwell Law. So in Thermodynamics it maybe the Coulomb Law working with
other than the Faraday Law. And perhaps even so, there maybe a principle in
physics of where it is a working together of the FAraday Law with the
Ampere-Maxwell Law leaving out the Coulomb Law. In an Atom Totality all the
forces and laws are connected and it is just our state of ignorance and
misunderstanding that keeps us from seeing the connections.

Archimedes Plutonium
www.iw.net/~a_plutonium
whole entire Universe is just one big atom where dots
of the electron-dot-cloud are galaxies

At least someone is THINKING about proving controlled fusion cannot
produce net work.

Anyway, what about uncontrolled fusion like setting off H-bombs in salt
domes?

Assuming there is some other way than fission, which requires a certain
mass, to set it off, is there any limit to scaling down?


Bret cahill

2 May 2005 12:06:22 -0700 Bret Cahill wrote:

At least someone is THINKING about proving controlled fusion cannot
produce net work.

Anyway, what about uncontrolled fusion like setting off H-bombs in salt
domes?

Assuming there is some other way than fission, which requires a certain
mass, to set it off, is there any limit to scaling down?


Trouble with uncontrolled fusion is that it uses too much fission energy
to detonate the bomb. So much fission material that it can yield
controlled energy in a fission power plant than what energy can be
collected from a fusion explosion.

We have a similar situation in agriculture today of its ethanol. The
amount of petrol fuel used to raise corn for ethanol is a net loss. That
we would be ahead if we bypassed the ethanol and just burned the petrol.
Caveat: that is modern agriculture but in primitive agriculture where corn
is grown without using one drop of petrol then any ethanol produced in
that system is a Net Gain.

No one wants to hear that fusion is impossible to surpass breakeven. Even
scientists are hopeful of harnessing fusion and are over-optimistic and
rosy in outlook. One of the reasons why only a few will even entertain the
idea of a Fusion Barrier Principle. And the fact that most scientists
working on fusion are paid to promote fusion and thereby ignore a Barrier
idea because then they would be out of their jobs.
And so many of us think that scientists are some of the most honest people
around, but when it comes to the truth of science or their jobs at stake,
scientists like most groups of people chose "jobs" rather than truth.

Archimedes Plutonium
www.iw.net/~a_plutonium
whole entire Universe is just one big atom where dots
of the electron-dot-cloud are galaxies

Archimedes Plutonium wrote:
2 May 2005 12:06:22 -0700 Bret Cahill wrote:

At least someone is THINKING about proving controlled fusion cannot
produce net work.

Anyway, what about uncontrolled fusion like setting off H-bombs in
salt
domes?

Assuming there is some other way than fission, which requires a
certain
mass, to set it off, is there any limit to scaling down?


Trouble with uncontrolled fusion is that it uses too much fission
energy
to detonate the bomb. So much fission material that it can yield
controlled energy in a fission power plant than what energy can be
collected from a fusion explosion.


Well, first off, I think the 'fusion barrier principle' is one of your
better ideas. You may well be right from a thermodynamic point of view,
though I don't feel qualified to 'pass judgement' one way or the
other. If you're correct it certainly is bad news as far as limiting
our potential options as far as energy once the fossil fuels are
no longer able to keep up with demand (which may already be starting
to happen with oil).

Bret beat me as far as inquiring about thermonukes - they definitely
do get more energy out than in, but beyond nanosecond timescales they
aren't well controlled You don't think it might be possible to
have some sort of staged fusion reaction, like a thermonuke, but
scaled down in size to the point where it could be used for power
production - and somehow use a non-fission trigger to get things
started. From what little I know about fusion and fusion cross
sections I tend to doubt it's possible, but who knows. (I know
I'm echoing bret here). It's just with the success of thermonukes
many people thought fusion power was a 'done deal', but it's proven
*much* more difficult than orginally thought to control and even
initiate.

Still, I think research into fusion is 'a good thing', and I think
there should be more of it.

Eric

Again, this is why I think the first practical fusion application will
be contained inside a (chemical) heat engine. There was a joke in the
nuclear (fission) business that physicists never designed a reactor
that worked. I think that we know enough about the phenomenon of
fusion now to give engineers a crack at it.

wrote:
Archimedes Plutonium wrote:
2 May 2005 12:06:22 -0700 Bret Cahill wrote:

At least someone is THINKING about proving controlled fusion
cannot
produce net work.

Anyway, what about uncontrolled fusion like setting off H-bombs
in
salt
domes?

Assuming there is some other way than fission, which requires a
certain
mass, to set it off, is there any limit to scaling down?


Trouble with uncontrolled fusion is that it uses too much fission
energy
to detonate the bomb. So much fission material that it can yield
controlled energy in a fission power plant than what energy can be
collected from a fusion explosion.


Well, first off, I think the 'fusion barrier principle' is one of
your
better ideas. You may well be right from a thermodynamic point of
view,
though I don't feel qualified to 'pass judgement' one way or the
other. If you're correct it certainly is bad news as far as limiting
our potential options as far as energy once the fossil fuels are
no longer able to keep up with demand (which may already be starting
to happen with oil).

Bret beat me as far as inquiring about thermonukes - they definitely
do get more energy out than in, but beyond nanosecond timescales they
aren't well controlled You don't think it might be possible to
have some sort of staged fusion reaction, like a thermonuke, but
scaled down in size to the point where it could be used for power
production - and somehow use a non-fission trigger to get things
started. From what little I know about fusion and fusion cross
sections I tend to doubt it's possible, but who knows. (I know
I'm echoing bret here). It's just with the success of thermonukes
many people thought fusion power was a 'done deal', but it's proven
*much* more difficult than orginally thought to control and even
initiate.

Still, I think research into fusion is 'a good thing', and I think
there should be more of it.

Eric

Trouble with uncontrolled fusion is that it

uses too much fission energy to detonate

the bomb. So much fission material that it

can yield controlled energy in a fission

power plant than what energy can be

collected from a fusion explosion.

Where would the heat from the bomb go besides the boiler?

A 1000' dome has a relatively large volume/surface area ratio and the
metal piping would have a large heat transfer area.

The heat transfer coefficient of the air or gas might be really high
right when the bomb goes off but soon after an insulating boundary
layer controls heat transfer rates.

Also the heat from the fission component is relatively small compared
to the the heat coming from the fusion. The fission fuel would need to
be able to put out at least several orders of magnitude more high
temperature heat in a controlled reactor than in a bomb for the above
to be true.

Finally, assuming a large amount of fission material remained after
each explosion, why couldn't that be processed for more fuel?

The reason the idea never caught on is because setting off H-bombs
under someone's county is politically incorrect, even in Texas. You
will never see me showing up at some bureaucrat's door asking for
permits, explaining, "the way it works is . . ." I already know the
response: "You want to do WHAT?!?!? Hey, everyone, this wacko wants
us to let him set off H-bombs over near Ed Wilson's ranch! Ha ha ha ha
ha."

The idea is useful because it demonstrates that net power from fusion
is indeed possible, at least above a certain scale.

The first question is can we set it off some other way besides fission
at ANY scale large or small?

The second question is how much can we scale down?

It may be possible to prove beyond any doubt that there's a limit to
scaling down, or even more convincingly, that fission is the only way
to get a good fusion explosion.


Bret Cahill

3 May 2005 01:38:39 -0700 wrote:


Well, first off, I think the 'fusion barrier principle' is one of your
better ideas. You may well be right from a thermodynamic point of view,

Well thank you. I am tempted to always ask those who are against the
Fusion Barrier Principle that the Universe is not open ended as far as
energy feeding is concerned. Humanity first tapped into fire of burning
wood. Then they tapped into coal, then petroleum and then they tapped into
fission nuclear. So these people who believe fusion is tappable, I am
curious as to where they think the Universe starts to get untappable. As
if the Universe is a open ended structure of tappable energy.

You see, I have placed Fusion as that endpoint of tapping, where Fission
is the highest form of energy and that beyond fission which is fusion is
untappable. So to my many adversaries of the Fusion Barrier Principle. The
burden is on them, not me. If they dislike the Fusion Barrier Principle,
then do they not see how childish of thoughts and childish beliefs they
have of energy. If they believe Fusion is tappable, then, where in their
understanding of Total Science does the tapping for them cease? Apparently
they must believe that somewhere down the future corridor of tapping of
Cosmic energy that the party is over with and there is no more tappable
energy.

Just unfortunate for life that Fusion is the NO-ZONE and that Fission is
the last and maximum tappable energy.

The construction of the Periodic Chart of Elements where most of the Chart
is predominately Fission, not fusion should persuade even the most deluded
Fusion scientist of a Fusion Barrier Principle. I mean, if the Chart were
split somewhat half and half into fusing elements instead of it being 99%
fission elements. And if Tin were the element stable to both fission and
fusion instead of Iron, then Logic would point to a non-Fusion Barrier
Principle.


though I don't feel qualified to 'pass judgement' one way or the
other. If you're correct it certainly is bad news as far as limiting
our potential options as far as energy once the fossil fuels are
no longer able to keep up with demand (which may already be starting
to happen with oil).

A Fusion Barrier Principle is one of the most important discoveries in all
of science. It is probably the most important reason Earth has never
received Aliens from alien planets because without fusion energy, space
travel is limited to solar systems, not interstellar. If Fusion Barrier
Principle were false, then Earth probably would have been colonized by
alien life thousands or perhaps millions of years ago.



Bret beat me as far as inquiring about thermonukes - they definitely
do get more energy out than in, but beyond nanosecond timescales they
aren't well controlled You don't think it might be possible to

It is important that you bring up the nanosecond factor. Regardless of the
mess that a thermonuke creates and the attempt to tapp some energy out of
that mess, is the factor that the time involved to tapp into that energy
is so brief that it is wiser to just burn the fission ignition fuse of the
nuke in a fission power plant and forgo the bomb itself.

So the two competing factors of "wreckage" of the site, ie, no possible
container, and secondly the nanoseconds or brief time to collect the
energy.




have some sort of staged fusion reaction, like a thermonuke, but
scaled down in size to the point where it could be used for power
production - and somehow use a non-fission trigger to get things

Perhaps there is no non-fission trigger. And I wonder if theoretically
that is connected to the Fusion Barrier Principle itself that nukes must
have a fission trigger. Laser beams can create fusion events but can they
create a fusion detonation; so I wonder if the necessity of a fission
trigger is a adjunct of the Fusion BArrier Principle itself.

Good question that you raise here.


started. From what little I know about fusion and fusion cross
sections I tend to doubt it's possible, but who knows. (I know
I'm echoing bret here). It's just with the success of thermonukes
many people thought fusion power was a 'done deal', but it's proven
*much* more difficult than orginally thought to control and even
initiate.

Still, I think research into fusion is 'a good thing', and I think
there should be more of it.

Eric

Research is always good and even if ITER is built and fails it will teach
us that much closer to the Fusion BArrier Principle. As long as the people
building ITER have the Fusion Barrier PRinciple in mind and not ignoring
or scorning or ridiculing FBP.

Archimedes Plutonium
www.iw.net/~a_plutonium
whole entire Universe is just one big atom where dots
of the electron-dot-cloud are galaxies

3 May 2005 05:59:21 -0700 Bret Cahill wrote:


Where would the heat from the bomb go besides the boiler?

A 1000' dome has a relatively large volume/surface area ratio and the
metal piping would have a large heat transfer area.

The heat transfer coefficient of the air or gas might be really high
right when the bomb goes off but soon after an insulating boundary
layer controls heat transfer rates.

Also the heat from the fission component is relatively small compared
to the the heat coming from the fusion. The fission fuel would need to
be able to put out at least several orders of magnitude more high
temperature heat in a controlled reactor than in a bomb for the above
to be true.

Finally, assuming a large amount of fission material remained after
each explosion, why couldn't that be processed for more fuel?


(snipped)



The idea is useful because it demonstrates that net power from fusion
is indeed possible, at least above a certain scale.

The first question is can we set it off some other way besides fission
at ANY scale large or small?

The second question is how much can we scale down?

It may be possible to prove beyond any doubt that there's a limit to
scaling down, or even more convincingly, that fission is the only way
to get a good fusion explosion.

Bret Cahill

Bret, you have to ask yourself analogous questions about the Heisenberg
Uncertainty Principle. Keep in mind the Fusion Barrier is another
"principle" of science.

You see, when the Uncertainty Principle came out and decades, and
half-centuries later there were even professors of physics and professors
of other sciences who did not understand what "principle" means. So they
were looking for a corner to cut, looking for some trick to pull, looking
for some dodge to play, looking for some shortcut to get around the
Uncertainty Principle. You see, they basically did not understand the
science.

The Fusion Barrier Principle is like the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle.
And the proof of the Fusion BArrier Principle is that you cannot enclose a
sphere into a cylinder or a cylinder into a sphere and have a volume
greater than 2/3 or surface area greater than 2/3. Impossible. We would
not have our Universe the way it is if you could surpass 2/3.

There were thousands, perhaps millions of people trying to topple the
Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, thinking that they were so smart as to
find the trick. In fact they were so stupid as to not understand the
principle for if they understood it they would realize it is hardcore.

None of your "tricks" above, Bret, will work. There is no container that
can siphon off the energy without being damaged by a nuke. And the brief
time spans of a nuke make it even more difficult. Save from finding a star
like the Sun and hauling it into orbit, there is no container for Fusion
that makes fusion energy tappable.

So in answer to one of your questions above Brett of what is the smallest
container for nukes and the answer is the smallest size star, but then you
would not need the bomb explosion. But it is impossible for life to cargo
haul around a star.

So that raises a new theoretical question. The relationship of life to the
smallest size star for which life can build and how it relates to the
Fusion Barrier Principle. Can life itself build a star? Somehow that
question relates to FBP. Life can build a nuke bomb, but can life build a
star?

Archimedes Plutonium
www.iw.net/~a_plutonium
whole entire Universe is just one big atom where dots
of the electron-dot-cloud are galaxies