January 04, 2010

Winterberg on Ultradense Deuterium

Ultradense Deuterium (21 page pdf) by Winterberg

An attempt is made to explain the recently reported occurrence of ultradense deuterium as an isothermal transition of Rydberg matter into a high density phase by quantum mechanical exchange forces. It is conjectured that the transition is made possible by the formation of vortices in a Cooper pair electron fluid, separating the electrons from the deuterons, with the deuterons undergoing Bose-Einstein condensation in the core of the vortices. If such a state of deuterium should exist at the reported density of about 100,000 g/cm3, it would greatly facility the ignition of a thermonuclear detonation wave in pure deuterium, by placing the deuterium in a thin disc, to be ignited by a pulsed ultrafast laser or particle beam of modest energy.

Nuclear fusion would have an energy requirement 100 thousand times lower with an ultradense deuterium target. Instead of a gigavolt generator (from a series of smaller generators) that is one kilometer long it would be just one megavolt generator.

A research group in Sweden at University of Gothenburg, under the leadership of Leif Holmlid, which has recently announced it had discovered an ultradense form of deuterium by a phase transition from a Rydberg matter state of deuterium, a million times more dense than liquid deuterium. Because this claim is so extraordinary, it must be taken with a great deal of skepticism. But since Leif Holmlid has an established record of publications about Rydberg matter in the refereed scientific literature the claim cannot be easily dismissed.

The idea to use the ultradense configuration of deuterium for the thermonuclear ignition of deuterium was not lost on the Swedish group who reported the existence of ultradense deuterium. Depending on its stability in would without any doubt to be for inertial confinement fusion. With a thousandfold compression, an energy in between 1 and 10 MJ is needed for ignition of the deuterium-tritium reaction. With the ignition temperature going in direct proportion of the ignition temperature, and in inverse proportion of the target density, with the ignition temperature of deuterium about 10 times larger, a further one thousand fold increase in the target density would bring down the ignition energy by a factor of 100 thousand, from 10^7 J to about 100J. With a bremsstrahlung radiation loss time at one million times solid density of deuterium at a temperature of ∼ 10^8 K about 2×10^-13 sec, the ignition power required would optimistically be ∼ a few petawatt. A more detailed estimate leads to an ignition energy about 1 kJ with an ignition power about 30 petawatt, still in what may be technically feasible, both with lasers and particle beams. The presumably high target density suggests a pancake type target, made from a thin sheet of ultradense deuterium.

During its transformation in the ultradense phase, the spatial dimension of the lens is decreased 100 fold, with the latent heat removed by heat conduction. The ignition can be initiated in the central spot of the lens, either by a petawatt laser or a charged particle beam. With the energy requirement for ignition decreased by a factor 100 thousand, the size of the capacitor of the super-Marx generator proposed for the ignition of a pure deuterium reaction would be smaller by the same factor, reducing its linear dimension 10^5/3 ≃ 50 fold, from one kilometer in length to 20 meter, and from a diameter of 20 meters down to less than 1 meter.

The publication by the Swedish research group contains a few hints for a possible explanation of ultradense deuterium:
1. The isothermal constant pressure transition to the ultradense phase is possible only for deuterium (D), not for hydrogen (H).
2. The two phases, the normal and ultradense, co-exist in a mixture of both.
3. The superdense phase is formed in pores with Fe2O3 acting as a catalyst [3].
4. The superdense phase can be reached only through a transition from Rydberg deuterium matter.
5. In the ultradense phase the kinetic energy and angular momentum of the electrons are “switched” to the energy and angular momentum of the deuterons.

If as reported the state of ultradense deuterium exists, and if it is sufficiently stable to exist long enough, it could be for the release of nuclear energy become as important as was the discovery of nuclear fission by Hahn and Strassmann. It is the purpose of this note that on purely theoretical grounds an ultradense state of deuterium cannot be easily dismissed.

Friedwardt Winterberg at wikipedia





Форма для связи


Email *

Message *