Hi Ed, On Sat, Feb 9, 2013 at 9:34 AM, Edmund Storms <[email protected]> wrote:
Any theory that proposes to use tunneling based on electrons being > concentrated must at the same time show how the resulting energy is > dissipated. This appears to be different from what Ron Maimon is proposing. The connection between electrons and what he's describing is the Auger process, not screening, per se. > Such energy is dissipated normally by the fusion product breaking into two > parts, which go off with high energy in directions required to conserve > momentum. This is called hot fusion and it is well known and understood. > I'm agnostic with regard to any fundamental distinction between "hot fusion" and "cold fusion," although I believe by this you mean primarily that hot fusion has certain byproducts which are different from what is seen in cold fusion. This point concerning evidence is very important and is well taken. Ron is suggesting that the deuterons, in fusing in the immediate vicinity of the palladium spectator nucleus (at a distance of the K shell), achieve two things that are not normally seen in hot fusion: 1. The resulting energy of the fusion is shared with the palladium spectator nucleus, such that there is no gamma for the d+d -> 4He branch, but instead a transfer of momentum to two things -- the palladium nucleus, on one hand, and the resulting alpha, on the other. 2. The other d+d branches, namely d+d -> t+p and d+d -> 3He+n, are suppressed. Item (2) is something we reverse engineered as a requirement of his description in an earlier thread on Vortex, and it is possible that he explicitly addresses it somewhere, although I do not recall where this was done. He's too familiar with the math and the physics of the system to have overlooked item (2), but I am interested to know more about how he proposes to bring it about. The electrons enter into this description via the Auger process. When an x-ray interacts with a lattice atom, often an electron will be ejected via the photoelectric effect, and then you might get a follow-on Auger cascade. Ron is saying that the math also leaves open the possibility that the electron hole created by the incoming x-ray will decay by imparting energy to a nearby deuterium nucleus, creating an "Auger deuteron." If an x-ray ejects a K-shell electron and creates a K-shell electron hole, the resulting transfer of energy to the deuterium nucleus would be ~20 keV. If Ron is correct and has not overlooked something important, the main byproducts will be heat, 4He, soft x-rays and a side channel of transmutations above and below the mass of palladium, which are useful for understanding the system but do not provide the main source of energy. The energy is largely dissipated in the system in the form of the momenta of the 4He and the palladium lattice atoms. There are several problems left open by this description, many or most of which are no doubt due to limitations in my own understanding, which Robin has been adept at calling out. For a layman's overview of Ron's approach, see [1]. I see that Ron has recently clarified a few points in a comment to that blog post. I appreciate that there are various theories out there of differing levels of plausibility, and it is easy for one's eyes to glaze over when reading an abstract of yet another theory, but Ron's approach seems well worth taking the additional time to understand. Personally, I have no strong investment in a mathematical description of these systems, and I am not persuaded of much in hearing that the quantum field theory equations for a given system are easy or hard to solve -- I get the distinct impression that any analytical solutions will be useful here primarily as a post hoc way of refining one's numerical model of the system, something that has been arrived at only after the basics have already been worked out qualitatively. It is the qualitative description that is most of interest to me at this point. Eric [1] http://rolling-balance.blogspot.com/2013/01/ron-maimons-theory.html
