On Fri, Feb 7, 2014 at 9:39 AM, Bob Cook <frobertc...@hotmail.com> wrote:
1. Is Rossi separating Ni isotopes for the Ni he uses in the reactor?
>
> This would be expensive.
>
I can only imagine. I'm not sure how one would go about enriching select
isotopes of nickel. Perhaps they have sufficiently different properties to
make separation straightforward? (E.g., maybe the spin-0 claim one hears
occasionally in connection with some isotopes, which is something I know
nothing about, can be made use of.) Hank Mills reports that Rossi has
found a cheap way to enrich the nickel, although I do not have an opinion
about this [1].
2. Is there radioactive ash (Ni-59 or Ni-63) left in the spent reactors?
>
I was thinking of radioactive species of copper and zinc, primarily. By
contrast, I believe 62Ni and 64Ni would go to stable isotopes of copper
after proton capture. In natural abundance, 58Ni is the most prevalent, at
68 percent:
p + 58Ni → 59Cu + ɣ + Q (2.9 MeV)
Here 59Cu is an unstable species which will beta-plus decay to 59Ni, which
will then transition to 59Co via electron capture. I believe it will be
accompanied by an Auger cascade, so there will be lots of activity taken
together. By contrast,
p + 62Ni → 63Cu + ɣ + Q (5.6 MeV)
Here 63Cu is a stable isotope. If one assumes the ɣ is somehow being
fractionated as a large set of lower-energy photons through some as-yet
discovered mechanism, as I suspect is happening (I'm rooting for an
interaction with the electronic structure, here), then you want 62Ni and
64Ni, because there will be no activity with these isotopes afterwards.
Using nickel in its natural isotopes will be like banging the keys on a
piano -- there will be lots of noise leaving the system.
> My final observation is that the Rossi-Focardi comment that there is no
> radioactivity in the residue needs to be checked.
>
Yes, very much so. This is one of those mutating details, subject to a
mysterious law of entropy, where one doesn't know what to believe. In a
related connection, I recall an anecdote of an experiment by one of the
Italian researchers, perhaps Piantelli, where some nickel that had been
undergoing a reaction was placed in a cloud chamber and all kinds of
activity was seen. If there is proton capture happening at a significant
level, and there is no activity, my guess is that this would be primarily
because Rossi has succeeded in enriching the nickel to suitable isotopes to
a high degree. But my understanding is that it is also the case that in
PdD experiments, transmutations are often seen to stable isotopes, so there
may be something inherent to cold fusion that leads to stable isotopes,
mitigating perhaps the need for enrichment to very high levels.
Eric
