On Aug 2, 2007, at 6:14 PM, Jones Beene wrote:
Historical note:
CETI has been mentioned - and their plastic beads. Everyone assumed
the beads were inactive and merely provide a neutral substrate. But
were they?
I think it was probably key that the sulfonated plastic diffused
hydrogen. The hydrogen that works to the back side of a Pd cathode
under low voltage electrolysis is under enormous pressure. The beads
were used in a fluidized bed arrangement, meaning current, and
hydrogen, flowed through them. Patterson's beads had the advantage
over glass beads that the metal plating would not as easily separate
during electrolysis. Obtaining high hydrogen fugacity, however, was
dependent mostly on the back most layer. It required just the right
(and probably almost impossible to obtain) characteristics to
maintain both the right diffusion rate and high fugacity. The other
layers had to be the right thickness to keep hydrogen diffusion at
the right speed. That's my guess.
Horace Heffner
http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/
