So Sorry, I can’t help myself…a beautiful mind cannot resist patterns...
Like bloodhound, I am encouraged that I am on the right scent as follows: Rice is also getting money from Wright Patterson Air Force Laboratory in Ohio the hub of drone research and development. They are also interested in nuclear powered drones. http://www.sciscoop.com/2003-2-19-22426-1883.html *US Air Force To Create Nuclear-Powered Drone Aircraft* *In the 1950s, both the US and the USSR tried to develop nuclear propulsion systems for piloted aircraft, but the plans were eventually scrapped because it would have cost too much to protect the crew from the on-board nuclear reactor, as well as making the aircraft too heavy. However, the US Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) now intends to abandon the conventional fission reactor design and instead focus on a new type of power generator called a quantum nucleonic reactor. * *In 1999, Carl Collins and colleagues from The Center for Quantum Electronics at the University of Texas at Dallas discovered that shining X-rays onto certain types of hafnium caused 60 times as much energy to be released as was put in. The X-rays encourage particles in the nuclei of radioactive hafnium-178 to jump down several energy levels, thus liberating energy in the form of gamma rays. These gamma rays could produce a jet of heated air, providing the thrust for the UAV.* *The quantum nucleonic reactor is considered safer than a fission reactor because the reaction is very tightly controlled. “It’s radioactive, but as soon as you take away the X-ray power source its gamma ray production is reduced dramatically, so it’s not as dangerous,” says Christopher Hamilton at the Wright Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio, who conducted the latest nuclear UAV study.* *http://www.sciscoop.com/2004-6-22-10046-8452-2.html*<http://www.sciscoop.com/2004-6-22-10046-8452-2.html> *Atomic Powered Global Hawk Jet Revving For Take-Off?* *AerospaceTuesday, June 22, 2004. Post by Ricky James* *SciScoop covered this story over a year ago, but it’s worth taking a look at again now because of new May 2004 cover stories in Popular Mechanics and Physics Today. Apparently there are classified efforts underway to modify an existing Global Hawk unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) with a quantum nucleonic reactor (QNR) to power its jet engine, allowing virtually unlimited time aloft. * *QNRs are a totally new nuclear technology developed in the 1990s that use neither fission or fusion of atoms. Instead, if you bombard the QNR fuel with X-rays from a standard hospital-type X-ray machine, the fuel gives off a stream of gamma rays that is 50 times more powerful and can directly heat a stream of air to push the aircraft forward. Thus you’re leveraging your available input power by a factor of fifty via a gizmo that produces no radioactive exhaust and can be throttled by controlling the X-ray generator. * *Turn off the X-rays, you turn off the QNR. Pretty neat if it works. Not everybody believes it has, does or will. Regardless, Los Alamos and Sandia nuclear engineers in New Mexico have been instructed to discourage public discussion of QNRs even as the Department of Defense has put the machine on its Militarily Critical Technologies List to put it on the fast track for future funding.* *The QNR fuel of choice is hafnium-178 (actually its metastable nuclear isomer, currently obtained by bombarding sub-hafnium elements with protons, neutrons and alpha particles), which has a half-life of only 30 years or so and isn’t particularly dangerous – OK, OK, compared to plutonium in a conventional fission nuclear reactor. No need to worry about a crash of a QNR Global Hawk; the crash site would clean itself up of any spilled radioactive material in a century or so! With a golfball-sized chunk of Hf-178m estimated as having the energy of ten kilotons of conventional explosives (half a Hiroshima), this technology is also a potential contender for a breakthrough Moon/Mars propulsion system. Or a superbomb. Or not.* I think metastable nuclear isomers are out and LENR is in. Cheers: Axil On Fri, Jul 20, 2012 at 1:57 AM, Axil Axil <[email protected]> wrote: > FYI > > Who’s doing research into the SWNT rug or carpet? > Rice University is way ahead of everybody else under a series of grants > from the Multidisciplinary Research Program of the ONR, the Office of Naval > Research and NASA. > > From the ONR office: > > > *The DoD expects that MURI programs will promote application of defense > research, principally for defense purposes but also for commercial > purposes. The research topics described in the MURI announcement generally > underpin dual use defense technologies that are critical to national > defense and that also have good potential for commercial application. > Interactions with research and development organizations that transition > research findings to application, particularly industrial organizations, > DoD laboratories, and other organizations that perform research and > development for defense applications, are encouraged.* > > > Being somewhat paranoid and prone to conspiracy theories, I find this > curious. > > > > Cheers: Axil > > > On Fri, Jul 20, 2012 at 1:05 AM, Axil Axil <[email protected]> wrote: > >> The SWNT rug part 1 >> >> Fabrication of the ideal charge delivery nanostructure for LENR may be >> beyond the capabilities and limited resources of the lone Ni/H reactor >> developer. This may be why Rossi has greatly benefited from collaboration >> with advanced technology partners who can design and implement advanced >> SWNT structures that are optimized for LENR. >> >> >> >> >> >> To get the most out of LENR, charge must be evenly spread over the entire >> surface area of the nickel nanoparticles, as large as that area may be. >> >> >> >> >> >> Most publically available LENR mechanisms currently found in LENR >> research suffer from a poor distribution of nuclear active sites. The >> energy production of these areas is limited in number. Furthermore, the >> distribution of the nuclear active sites (NAS) is random and poorly placed. >> This all leads to a proportionately small productivity of the Ni/H >> reaction. But if properly configured,* *nanomaterial is a powerful >> multiplier of the LENR effect in inverse proportion to its dimensionality. >> >> >> >> >> >> For example, if you want to properly water a corn field to get optimum >> crop yield, we do not want to pump all the irrigation water into a big hole >> in a corner at the edge of the field and hope for the best. >> >> >> >> >> >> A water distribution system; a sprinkler or drip system must be >> engineered to get water to each corn plant at optimum levels. >> >> >> >> >> >> Like water dumped into a hole, A spark can only be delivered to a small >> volume of material in a localize area. The reaction, if any, will be >> limited by the restrictions of this localized charge distribution strategy. >> >> >> >> >> >> >> To increase the power of the LENR reaction, the number of NASs must be >> dramatically increased. >> >> >> >> >> >> The spark should be optimally partitioned and spread out over the widest >> area, in the same way that nano-particles multiply the surface area of its >> bulk material. So charge distribution and nanoparticle area should be >> properly mated through an optimal connection. >> >> >> >> >> >> If this relationship between charge presentation and the associated >> nanoparticle is optimize, a large amount of power can be produced by a >> small amount of Nano-powder. As improbable as Rossi’s claim may now sound >> …those one and a half grams of Nano nickel powder can generate 10 kilowatts >> of power… This amazing claim may be possible if every nano particle >> grain is pressed into service in an optimal way. >> >> >> >> >> >> In my next post, I intend to reference a paper recently commissioned by >> the US Defense Department (DOD) to explain why a SWNT rug can get charge to >> nickel Nano powder is the best way. This explanation will act as a >> narrative for a specification of a charge distribution system for LENR. >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> Cheers: Axil >> >> >> >> >> >> * * >> >> >> >> >> > >
