Posted on 03/09/2022 12:41:56 PM PST by Kevmo
Thermonuclear Fusion in a Sheared-Flow Z-Pinch: Advancing Another Viable Pathway to Fusion Energy
TOPICS:DOEFusion EnergyLawrence Livermore National LaboratoryNational Ignition FacilityPlasma Physics By LAWRENCE LIVERMORE NATIONAL LABORATORY MARCH 9, 2022
Plasma Energy Fusion Concept
In findings that could help advance another “viable pathway” to fusion energy, research led by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) physicists has proven the existence of neutrons produced through thermonuclear reactions from a sheared-flow stabilized Z-pinch device.
The researchers used advanced computer modeling techniques and diagnostic measurement devices honed at the Lab to solve a decades-old problem of distinguishing neutrons produced by thermonuclear reactions from ones produced by ion beam-driven instabilities for plasmas in the magneto-inertial fusion regime.
While the team’s previous research showed neutrons measured from sheared-flow stabilized Z-pinch devices were “consistent with thermonuclear production, we hadn’t completely proven it yet,” said LLNL physicist Drew Higginson, one of the co-authors of a paper recently published in Physics of Plasmas.
“This is direct proof that thermonuclear fusion produces these neutrons and not ions driven by beam instabilities,” said Higginson, principal investigator of the Portable and Adaptable Neutron Diagnostics (PANDA) team that is doing research under a Department of Energy Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) cooperative agreement. “It’s not proven they’re going to get energy gain, but it is a promising result that suggests they are on a favorable path.”
LLNL physicist James Mitrani was the lead author on the paper, which demonstrates how the Lab’s broad range of research is benefiting the larger fusion community beyond the major advancements made by LLNL’s National Ignition Facility (NIF), the world’s most energetic laser system.
Fusion Z-Pinch Experiment (FuZE) LLNL physicist James Mitrani sets up scintillator detectors to measure neutrons on the University of Washington’s Fusion Z-Pinch Experiment (FuZE) device. Credit: LLNL
“The research only focused on this one device,” Mitrani said, “but the general techniques and concepts are applicable to a lot of fusion devices in this intermediate magneto-inertial fusion regime.” He noted that regime operates in the area between laser fusion facilities, such as NIF and the Omega Laser Facility at the University of Rochester, and fusion devices that confine plasmas in the purely magnetic regime, like ITER (a multinational project in southern France), SPARC (under construction near Boston) or other tokamak devices.
Since August, NIF has generated buzz throughout the global scientific community because an inertial confinement fusion (ICF) experiment yielded a record 1.35 megajoules (MJ) of energy. That milestone brought researchers to the threshold of ignition — defined by the National Academy of Sciences and the National Nuclear Security Administration as when a NIF implosion produces more fusion energy than the amount of laser energy delivered to the target. That shot was preceded by progress LLNL researchers made in achieving a burning plasma state in laboratory experiments (see “Nature: How Researchers Achieved Burning Plasma Regime at NIF”).
Fusion is the energy source found in the sun, stars and thermonuclear weapons. NIF’s ICF experiments focus 192 laser beams on a small target to compress and heat partially frozen hydrogen isotopes inside a fuel capsule, creating an implosion replicating the conditions of pressure and temperature found only in the cores of stars and giant planets and in exploding nuclear weapons. Z pinch machines accomplish fusion using a powerful magnetic field to confine and “pinch” the plasma.
The Z pinch concept is a relatively simple design that has existed as a theoretical model since the 1930s. But Higginson noted it had a long history of “terrible instabilities” that hindered the ability to generate the conditions needed to attain a net fusion energy gain.
Scintillator Detectors Neutron Measurements FuZE Device The top photo shows one of the scintillator detectors used for neutron measurements on the FuZE device. The bottom simplified schematic shows the physical mechanism for pulse generation in the detector, where recoil protons produced by fast neutron interactions generate light via excitation and ionization of the scintillating medium. The scintillation light is converted to an electric signal using a photomultiplier tube (PMT). Credit: LLNL
In the 1990s, LLNL scientists began working with University of Washington (UW) researchers to advance another promising path toward ignition, the sheared-flow stabilized Z-pinch concept. Instead of powerful stabilizing magnets used in other Z-pinch devices, sheared-flow stabilized Z-pinch devices use pulsed electrical current to generate a magnetic field flowing through a column of plasma to reduce fusion-disrupting instabilities.
“The problem with instabilities is that they don’t create a viable path to energy production, whereas thermonuclear fusion does,” Higginson said. “It’s always been tricky to diagnose this difference, especially in a Z-pinch.”
In 2015, LLNL and UW researchers were awarded a $5.28 million ARPA-E cooperative agreement to test the physics of pinch stabilization at higher energies and pinch current under the university’s Fusion Z-Pinch Experiment (FuZE) project.
Under a subsequent ARPA-E “capability team” cooperative agreement, LLNL researchers focused on diagnostics that measured the neutron emissions produced during the fusion process, including the spatial locations and time profiles of those emissions. Combining the plasma diagnostic expertise of national laboratories and the agile operation of private companies draws on each of their individual strengths and is a key objective of the ARPA-E fusion capability team program.
As the radius of the FuZE cylinder narrowed to increase compression, it also would create dips in the plasma that generated much stronger magnetic fields that would cause the plasma to pinch inwards more in certain spots than in others. Like the pinched ends of a popular tubular minced meat, those undesired “sausage” instabilities would create beams of faster ions that produced neutrons that could be confused with desired thermonuclear-produced neutrons.
LLNL researchers placed two plastic scintillator detectors outside of the device to measure traces of neutrons as they emerged in just a few microseconds from different points and angles outside the Z-pinch chamber.
“We showed that emitted neutron energies were equal at different points around this device, which is indicative of thermonuclear fusion reactions,” Mitrani said.
The analysis included creating histograms of the neutron pulses detected by the two scintillators and comparing them using methods such as Monte Carlo computerized simulations that examine all possible outcomes.
The diagnostics aren’t new, Higginson said, but “the idea of using histograms of individual neutron pulse energies to measure the anisotropy — the difference in energies when you look in different directions — is a new technique and is something we thought of, developed and implemented here. In addition, we have been working with UC Berkeley, which has helped us to develop the modeling capability to iron out the uncertainties in the measurements and completely understand the data we’re seeing. We’re not just looking through raw data.”
The paper, “Thermonuclear neutron emission from a sheared-flow stabilized Z-pinch,” was published in November and stemmed from an invited talk Mitrani presented at the American Physical Society-Division of Plasma Physics annual meeting in 2020.
Mitrani and Higginson were joined by LLNL colleague Harry McLean; Joshua Brown and Thibault Laplace of UC Berkeley; Bethany Goldblum of UC Berkeley and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory; and Elliot Claveau, Zack Draper, Eleanor Forbes, Ray Golingo, Brian Nelson, Uri Shumlak, Anton Stepanov, Tobin Weber and Yue Zhang of the University of Washington.
The research spun off a privately funded Seattle startup named Zap Energy in 2017.
Research is continuing under new grants, with more detailed measurements taken by 16 detectors as Zap Energy continues experiments.
“We want to be involved because we don’t know what surprises might arise,” Higginson said. “It could turn out that as you go to a higher current, all of a sudden you start driving instabilities again. We want to be able to prove as the current goes up that it is possible to maintain a high quality and stable pinch.”
Reference: “Thermonuclear neutron emission from a sheared-flow stabilized Z-pinch” by James M. Mitrani, Joshua A. Brown, Bethany L. Goldblum, Thibault A. Laplace, Elliot L. Claveau, Zack T. Draper, Eleanor G. Forbes, Ray P. Golingo, Harry S. McLean, Brian A. Nelson, Uri Shumlak, Anton Stepanov, Tobin R. Weber, Yue Zhang and Drew P. Higginson, 23 November 2021, Physics of Plasmas. DOI: 10.1063/5.0066257
This is an update to the 2015 DARPA-E $30Million grant — this team won 1/6th of it.
https://www.llnl.gov/news/fusion-could-be-zapped-reality
Fusion could be ‘ZaPped’ into reality
With funding from the Department of Energy, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and the University of Washington (UW) will work to advance the sheared-flow stabilized Z-pinch concept and assess its potential for scaling to fusion conditions.
Fusion is the same energy that powers the sun and the stars, and scientists have worked for years to create the same power on Earth. The ultimate goal is to get more energy out than it takes to power the system itself. In this project, the researchers will upgrade an existing Z-pinch system to test the physics of pinch stabilization at significantly higher discharge energy and pinch current.
The team was awarded $5.28 million from ARPA-E’s Accelerating Low-cost Plasma Heating and Assembly (ALPHA) Program.
The ARPA-E ALPHA projects are aimed at developing prototype technologies to explore new pathways to fusion power. The UW/LLNL team was one of nine winners of the $30 million call for proposals.
The Z-pinch is a geometrically simple and elegant approach to fusion, utilizing an electric current to simultaneously magnetically confine, compress and heat a cylinder of plasma. However, the traditional Z-pinch has been plagued by instabilities that prevent attainment of conditions required for net fusion energy output.
Sheared axial flows have been shown to stabilize disruptive Z-pinch instabilities at modest plasma conditions. “Through experimental and computational studies, the team will attempt to scale this concept to high current, plasma density and temperature with a goal of demonstrating a more practical path to a compact, low-cost fusion reactor,” said Harry McLean, a physicist within the Fusion Energy Sciences Program at LLNL and project scientist leading LLNL’s side of the partnership..
The project will take three years to complete. Based on a seminal publication authored in 1995 by Uri Shumlak, now a UW professor and the project lead scientist, along with Charles Hartman of LLNL, and further motivated by encouraging experimental results in the intervening 20 years, the program combines experimental and computational efforts to answer key questions on whether the sheared-flow stabilized Z-pinch concept has the potential for scaling to a fusion power reactor.
The existing “ZaP” experiment, as it is called and sited at UW and operating for the past 16 years, has shown promising results at low discharge current and input energy. This device provides the starting point for the proposed project and has identified the fundamental issues to be addressed:
The device shows stability at low current, but can the device be scaled to the levels necessary to reach fusion plasma conditions by increasing input energy?
The physics of establishing the flow conditions initially for stability are understood at low energy, but can flow conditions be controlled when high plasma currents are used?
Fundamental plasma physics questions exist about the ratio of current density to plasma density as the pinch evolves.
The objectives of work require that the discharge current and energy be increased by a factor of 10. This requires two large construction tasks: installing a larger capacitor bank for more input energy and fabricating new electrodes to handle the higher energy. LLNL will relocate and adapt pulse power systems, controls and data acquisition equipment used in previous fusion experiments at LLNL. UW postdocs and graduate students, under the direction of professor Brian Nelson at UW, will redesign the existing electrodes, which form the flow conditions and generate the flow Z-pinch plasma, to handle the much larger currents and heat loads expected. Both institutions will collaborate in performing experiments and adding new diagnostics and control systems.
Integrated computer modeling will play a critical role in this effort in two key areas: achieving predictive whole-machine modeling capability and guiding the next steps as performance is scaled up. In addition to macro-scale fluid modeling, particle-in-cell kinetic modeling will interrogate the physics at the smallest scales. These codes and computing platforms only recently have advanced to the point where details of sheared-flow stabilization can be examined. LLNL Engineering Group Leader Andrea Schmidt will lead the kinetic modeling efforts for the team. Shumlak and Nelson will lead the fluid modeling activities.
“The flow-stabilized Z-pinch is a simple and compact device with compelling features, such as easy integration with liquid walls and no large magnetic coils. This eliminates many of the unresolved materials and technology problems facing most other fusion power concepts. If the plasma physics works out as we scale up in energy, the device could make a very attractive fusion power system” McLean said.
Tags:Physical & Life Sciences
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Keywords: ColdFusion; LENR; lanr; CMNS
chat—science
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For beginners:
http://lenr-canr.org/
Click on “Introduction”
https://lenr-canr.org/wordpress/?page_id=263
Vortex-L
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Acronyms:
LENR: Low Energy Nuclear Reactions. [Also Lattice Enabled Nuclear Reactions, but seldom used]
CANR: Chemical Assisted Nuclear Reactions [fallen into disuse along with LANR/Lattice Assisted Nuclear Reactions]
CMNS: Condensed Matter Nuclear Science
LCF: Lattice Confined Fusion [NASA’s term for it]
AHE: Anomolous Heating Effect. Also PFAHE, for the Pons-Fleischmann AHE.
Best book to get started on this subject:
EXCESS HEAT
Why Cold Fusion Research Prevailed by Charles Beaudette
https://www.abebooks.com/9780967854809/Excess-Heat-Why-Cold-Fusion-0967854806/plp
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slow
My sheared-flow stabilized Z-pinch device never did that.
“This is direct proof that thermonuclear fusion produces these neutrons and not ions driven by beam instabilities,”
***LENR researchers have been documenting neutrons in their research for a long time, including in their ion beam experiments.
Have you considered a sheared-flow non-stabilized Z-pinch device?...
Discussion at LENR-Forum
https://www.lenr-forum.com/forum/thread/5789-norront-fusion-energy-as/
I do not know how we missed this company, but they are solid, well funded, and have some of the most respected names in LENR behind them. Call it what you will...Muon Catalyzed, UDD, whatever...it is all in the LENR family as far as I am concerned. And when they have names like Holmlid, Olaffson, and Gunderson ( who Mizuno recently gifted a reactor to) backing it, they have to be taken seriously. Not much on the internet about them, but here is one translated article about them:
GU Ventures company UltraFusion Nuclear Power is merged with Norrønt Fusion Energy
Press Release • May 08, 2018 14:51 CEST
GU Venture Incubator Company UltraFusion Nuclear Power AB, founded with Professor Leif Holmlid at Gothenburg University, has collaborated with Norrønt Fusion Energy AS. The purpose is to combine companies’ results, to resource efficiency and speed up product development of the new merger reactor.
UltraFusion Nuclear Power AB (”UltraFusion”) is based on fusion research by Leif Holmlid, Professor Emeritus at Gothenburg University, and is owned by him and GU Ventures. UltraFusion managed to experiment experimentally with a new, functional small-scale fusion process that works and gives energy over break-even, which means that more energy comes out of the system than it is supplied. It’s a unique result that has been very difficult to show earlier. It was published in a scientific journal (AIP Advances 5, 2015) and was attracted to press internationally. After that, work has continued and several new results have been achieved and patented.
Norrønt Fusion Energi AS (”Norrønt”) has in parallel built up its own prototype and demonstrator, partly differently designed but based on the same research. It shows the same unique results. For more than three years, Ultra¬Fusion and Norrønt have had cooperation, which has now led to the merger of companies. The main reason for the merger is that resources should be used in a more efficient manner and that the next version of the fusion reactor can be obtained faster.
“Leif Holmlid has gone a different way from the major international merger projects with regard to what is called cold merger. Thanks to his choice to do that, it has produced extremely interesting results. Now we want to show that it also works on a larger scale. Together with Norrønt, we will reach the target faster, “says Roger Cederberg, chairman of UltraFusion.
Dr. Dag H. Zeiner-Gundersen and PhD student Sindre Zeiner-Gundersen lead the research and commercialization in Norrønt in Norway.
“The Nordic Alliance with Norrønt is now conducting extensive research and commercialization efforts to produce clean and efficient energy from ultra-low deuterium, a form of hydrogen. We are now working on optimizing and scaling up technology for a number of industrial applications, Dr. Day H. Zeiner-Gunder.
Fusion is an energy source that potentially can make a major contribution to the host’s energy and replace coal and oil.
Appreciated, as always.
I'd be more interested in a gentle-flow stabilized non-pinch device.
That is a solid consideration.
Please refrain from posting anything that doesn’t legitimately address the issue. ~ Sidebar Moderator https://freerepublic.com/focus/chat/3977426/posts?page=19#19 —————————————————————————————
The Z-Pinch machine is left over technology from the development of advanced thermonuclear weapons.
And yes it really does work and is probably farther along than any other system out there.
The problem is after every “shot”, it takes I think a couple weeks to rebuild.
I hear when it goes off, it shakes the entire building.
The Z-Pinch Machine
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaopaLJk3-Y
In the words of Bob Marley: Nevah gonna hoppen, mon. A lot of money seeking a chimera.
Not for CHF [Controlled Hot Fusion].
Cold Fusion is 25 ORDERS of MAGNITUDE better bang for the buck than CHF.
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/4000502/posts?page=45#45
I hear when it goes off, it shakes the entire building.
***They showed that in the video. I think it might be the Poynting Vector discharging.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poynting_vector
If you apply that to an asymmetrical capacitor, you generate enough force to lift that entire building, known as the Befield-Brown effect.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biefeld%E2%80%93Brown_effect
Seriously? This is Free Republic. Good natured silliness is part of our nature. Everyone ridicules and parodies everything. Its what conservatives do. Are you logged in? When did this new Janet Reno policy come along?
After at least a decade of harassment from seagulls on these LENR threads, yes: Seriously.
The mods take it seriously on ~qtard threads, even those not deliberately labelled as protected. And the religion mod has taken it seriously on those heated religion threads for a much longer time.
This topic attracted gang trolls and deliberate railroading of the serious scientific discussion intended to take place.
So take the advice given in the intro blurb: If you want to exchange seagull greetings with other gang trolls, open your own thread. Some of us will even join you.
You need a (No humor caucus)
I’ll try to remember not to post humor on Kevmo threads. But no guarantees.
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