At 03:42 AM 4/10/2012, Alain Sepeda wrote:
Some point agains WL by AUL Lomax are ok, but they also are against DD fusion.
Depends. What is "DD fusion"?
There is a known set of reactions which can be called "DD fusion."
That is not what is happening in the FPHE. Obviously.
The Storms review (2010) does not claim "DD fusion," rather he writes
about the fusion of deuterons. He does not specify the number
involved, and one of the theories he cites is Takahashi's 4D BEC
collapse fusion theory. Hence I typically write about "deuterium
fusion," without specifying the mechanism. If deuterium is being
converted to helium, with no other major products, the heat generated
will be 23.8 MeV/He-4. If this is through 4D fusion to Be-8, no
gammas are expected, and there is no rate issue, because the 4D
collapse is a single BEC formation and collapse. The intermediate
product is formed within a BEC, and we don't really know, as far as I
can tell, how this would behave. But Be-8 is highly unstable, I think
the half-life under normal circumstances is a femtosecond, and it
would decay to two alpha particles. Plus, of course, the four electrons.
gamma are expected in both cases.
They are expected with ordinary d-d fusion to He-4, which is a very
rare branch.
Nobody is proposing that kind of d-d fusion.
WL give a strange solution, but DD give none...
I'll say it again, nobody is proposing "DD."
especially if you take into account Ni+H, W+D,... and also the
strange LENR that WL have gathered (ligtnings, rocks breaking,
wires explosion, coke factory nitrogen anomaly, japanese arcing in oil, )...
So there should be a different mechanism for Ni+H...
Obviously. No matter what, in fact, unless Widom and Larsen or
someone else can explain, and test, a common mechanism.
He4 as explains give no hint on the precise reaction, and DD or WL
are solutions.
Sure. Quite the same. "Solutions" that don't match the experimental
evidence, either one.
the fact that WL does not give unique answer to the 31Mev average
energy, is a reason to keep open to alternatives. It is clear that
WL cycles are very various, and their might even be some "no cycle",
or soup cooking...
There is no evidence for *any* of these transmutations. It's all made
up. I.e., W-L say that X -> Y could happen. Fine. If you get these
neutrons, that could happen. Now take that idea and make some
specific predictions where the results can be observed. That has not
been done, as far as anything published. What seems obvious to
informed observers is that W-L theory makes some obvious predictions
that are contradicted by the evidence. If that's incorrect, where is
the analysis by W-L that it's incorrect?
Essentially, they are stonewalling.
Larsen in his slide does not criticize Mac Kubre experiment, on the
opposite, he support that his results are better than what he says himself.
He seems more to criticize the Error margin that seems to match just
too fine the DD theory.
There is no "DD theory."
There is an obvious deuterium fusion theory, which need not involve
"d-d fusion." Or there might be some form of d-d fusion that guides
the fusion to only the helium result, with phonon transfer of energy
to the lattice. Maybe.
But it doesn't matter. We don't have the mechanism, and Widom and
Larsen don't take us closer to having it; the theory, indeed, creates
new mysteries. One aspect of it, essential to any continued
consideration of possible neutron formation, would be verifying the
gamma absorption.
That's completely missing. We have no reports of any experiments to
find it. I'll repeat: Larsen was asked by Garwin about this and
declined to comment, claiming that the information was proprietary.
Well, they now have a patent on a gamma shield. So ... where is the evidence?
A patent is invalid if it does not provide adequate information to
make a working device. I suspect they have an invalid patent....
the lack of detected neutrons could work with DD->He4, but this
branch (probability 1/137 compared to T+n & al) is strange... even
more than heavy electrons... good reason to have no strong opinion
on any of the two theories.
Two bogus theories, you are shuffling them around and comparing them.
If you want to look at 4D -> 2 He-4, that's more plausible, but still
remains incomplete and unproven.
We *know* what will happen if there are loose slow neutrons on the
surface of an FPHE cathode, and that doesn't happen, the evidence is
strong. We don't know what will happen if a BEC forms from two
deuterium molecules and collapses to fuse to Be-8.
This is important: if the precursor physical configuration, with two
deuterium molecules in a certain arrangement that might be possible,
forms a BEC and collapses, it *will* fuse, 100%. That's what
Takahashi showed, though I'd be far happier if his study were
independently confirmed. That was just a "test" configuration, and he
didn't study how far the material could deviate from the pure
tetrahedral symmetric configuration. Kim suggests BECs in general,
it's roughly the same idea.
Because of recent evidence, still unpublished, I'm wondering, myself,
if a BEC can form with a single deuterium molecule. Because it is
looking a bit like the reaction might indeed involve only two
deuterons. I hope to be able to discuss this publicly soon.
But my primary concern is with experimental evidence. Having a
plausible theory is great, but proves almost nothing except the
possibility of a plausible theory, and there can exist more than one
plausible theory, even if we have only imagined one.
globally it seems that something is missing in each theoretical approach.
we should stay openmind.
We should stay open-minded no matter what. Science is not about
fixing conclusions and turning them into rigid beliefs.
And then there is engineering....
the neutrons, and weak interaction seems an interesting direction...
WL theory have weaknesses. Heavy electrons, are know phenomenons,
but in that context it is hard to swallow naively... Naively
isotropic screening of gamma seems strange, but maybe is ther
something we miss, or that even the theorist missed.
maybe is there a similar theory, waiting to be found...
There are piles of theories to explain cold fusion, and many are
still being explored. There is no particular shortage of theories,
or, more accurately, imaginations. There is a shortage of
experimental exploration of specific theories.
I know of one recent exploration, and it's important. Hagelstein,
exploring vacancy theory, wherein normal lattice vacancies, which
will form in palladium at approxiimately known rates, and in
conjunction with his ideas about phonon transfer from the reaction to
the lattice, predicted that stimulation of a Letts cathode (that's a
piece of carefully prepared palladium foil, loaded with deuterium to
perhaps 85% loading, and then plated with gold) at certain phonon
frequencies, specifically 8 and 15 THz, would show resonance effects
at those frequencies. Letts confirmed this, published in 2008, using
dual laser stimulation with beat frequencies, scanning the THz
region. A resonance was also found at 22 THz, which is speculatively
explained as being due to hydrogen presence.
This is a preliminary confirmation of Hagelstein's work. A lot of
work remains to be done.
If Hagelstein's vacancy theory is correct, fusion rate is highly
correlated with vacancy formation rate, which varies with
temperature. Obviously vacancy formation rate is not the only
required condition.
What this suggests is that a vacancy in the palladium matrix,
produced by a palladium atom being knocked out of position (it takes
about 1 eV to do this), may be the Nuclear Active Environment.
But much remains to be explored, and this would not explain the
specific mechanism.
more classic DD fusion also have problems, but could be accepted
when we discover some new facts, like done for WL with the heavy electron idea.
the branch ratio, the Ni+H success raise problems...
What new "fact"? an imagination is not a fact, except, of course, as
an imagination. Yes, Virginia, you imagine Santa Claus.
what we know from the experiments :
- reaction Pd+D happens, but also less Pd+H, strong Ni+H, W+D...
No, we don't know that. PdD is very well established. PdH is not.
Ni-H is not nearly as established. There is some evidence for WD.
- clear energy production, with nuclear source (or at least more
than chemical)
"Nuclear" is known from PdD. "Clean" is speculative, in fact, because
this starts to refer to commercial levels of power production, and we
don't know what it takes to satisfy commercial requirements. Ni-H,
for example *may not be clean."
We cannot make conclusions from secret, proprietary information.
- nearly no neutrons or ultra slow neutrons
W-L theory uses ULM neutrons, i.e, very slow. Why they would be very
slow is a bit mysterious, but I won't go there now.
- nearly no gamma at level coherent with power
Yes. Helium is being produced without gammas, that's very clear.
- transmutation of heavy nuclei, letting hypothesis of nucleon
absorption by heavy nucleus
Heavy nuclear transmutation is not well established, compared to
helium and heat. Probably, yes, but the levels are low enough that
they cannot have much to do with the primary reaction, as it normally proceeds.
- He4 correlated to power, coherent with DD or WL phenomenons
WL fails to explain the observed correlation. Deuterium fusion (not
"DD") does explain it, reasonably well, with additional work suggested.
this let room for many solutions, and WL is imperfectly filing some
holes. DD impertect too.
Again, red herring. "DD" is not a fusion theory that is tenable, even
if an eventual theory does perhaps involved some kind of DD fusion.
W-L theory is untenable, it's noise at this point.
Krivit and Larsen appear to want to compare W-L theory with "DD."
That could make W-L theory look good! But it's a false comparison,
and W-L theory, on it's own, is *preposterous*.
That is, if neutrons are being formed as described, we would
*strongly* expect certain results that don't happen. A whole series
of "miracles" are required, not just one.
If that expectation is incorrect, nevertheless this is the common
understanding among most experts, as far as I've seen. And Larsen,
with his beautiful slide show, hasn't begun to address the objections
adequately to even motivate others to try replication or
falsification experiments. W-L theory has been around for years, it's not new.
