See:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/letters/story/0,3604,1525690,00.html
Letters
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Nuclear energy options
Monday July 11, 2005
The Guardian
The official word is that the international thermonuclear experimental
reactor is the way ahead for clean energy from nuclear fusion, though it
will be decades before usable energy will materialise (Letters, July 1).
Commitment to this approach seems to have led to officialdom deciding to
ignore apparently promising alternatives, such as a process known as
sonofusion, featured in a recent lecture by Professor Rusi Taleyarkhan of
Purdue University. This uses sound waves to create bubbles in a liquid and
then collapse them, very high temperatures occurring at the point of collapse.
It has been known for some time that flashes of light are sometimes
generated in such a situation, but Taleyarkhan and his co-workers appear to
have shown that under carefully specified conditions nuclear fusion also
occurs. His claims, published in Science and in the Physical Review, are
based on the detection of nuclear products as well as on a range of other
checks. A replication by another group has been published recently in
Nuclear Engineering and Design, so the claims cannot readily be dismissed.
This work indicates fairly definitively that thermonuclear temperatures can
be produced simply, in a table-top experiment, forcing one to take
seriously the stronger claims of Stringham et al. They also use sonofusion,
but have the bubbles collapse at a metal surface, and claim this greatly
enhances the yield of the fusion process. Power outputs in a small volume
of the order of 50 watts are currently claimed, and they are working
towards power generation in the kilowatt range. Dare one hope that some of
Iter's budget might be diverted to possibilities such as these?
Prof Brian Josephson
University of Cambridge
