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Fusion energy without radioactivity: laser ignition of solid hydrogen–boron (11) fuel
The advent of ultra-high power lasers allows laser power levels that are about 1000 times the power ^ | July 07, 2011 | Brian Wang

Posted on 07/09/2011 8:18:16 PM PDT by jmcenanly

The advent of ultra-high power lasers allows laser power levels that are about 1000 times the power of all the power stations in the USA. This opens the way to new approaches for inertial confinement fusions (ICF) that in turn can drastically reduce the laser input energy needed to achieve practical ICF power. The specific approach discussed here involves inducing a fusion burn wave by laser-driven impact of a relatively large block of plasma on the outside of a solid density fusion target. This new method is specifically selected to enable the extremely attractive, but demanding, neutron-free proton–B-11 fusion that potentially can lead to the long sought goal of an ultra ‘‘clean’’ fusion power plant.

(Excerpt) Read more at nextbigfuture.com ...


TOPICS: Science
KEYWORDS: energy; fusion
Boron can be isolated from Borate salts, which can be found in the U.S. The main problem will be getting permission to mine it.
1 posted on 07/09/2011 8:18:22 PM PDT by jmcenanly
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To: jmcenanly; Kevmo

Ping!.....


2 posted on 07/09/2011 8:25:36 PM PDT by Red Badger (Casey Anthony: "Surprise, surprise."...............)
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To: jmcenanly

If it does anything to make the US independent of Muslim crude oil, Obastard will oppose it.


3 posted on 07/09/2011 8:27:44 PM PDT by Blood of Tyrants (Islam is the religion of Satan and Mohammed was his minion.)
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To: jmcenanly
This opens the way to new approaches for inertial confinement fusions (ICF) that in turn can drastically reduce the laser input energy needed to achieve practical ICF power.

Next they should work on a new approach for a super efficient coal powered steam-shovel that can drastically reduce the amount of coal necessary to run the steam-shovel.

4 posted on 07/09/2011 8:30:30 PM PDT by higgmeister ( In the Shadow of The Big Chicken!)
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To: jmcenanly

This can’t allowed - it’s too dangerous. Lasers kill people, just ask the people of Alderaan.


5 posted on 07/09/2011 8:31:45 PM PDT by Titus Quinctius Cincinnatus ("Armed forces abroad are of little value unless there is prudent counsel at home." - Cicero)
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To: jmcenanly

6 posted on 07/09/2011 8:33:48 PM PDT by Red Badger (Casey Anthony: "Surprise, surprise."...............)
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To: jmcenanly

Do they still mine borax out in california? Just asking. I’ve looked into IEF research that Farnsworth, Hirsch, Langmuir, and others have done, and the H-B11 reaction has shown the most promise for clean fusion reactions.


7 posted on 07/09/2011 8:34:44 PM PDT by factoryrat (We are the producers, the creators. Grow it, mine it, build it.)
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To: Titus Quinctius Cincinnatus

They’re all dead!


8 posted on 07/09/2011 8:34:48 PM PDT by rsobin
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To: jmcenanly

Sorry... I’ll stick with eCat ... Which won’t be centrally controlled and cheap to maintain

Which, of course, is the reason ‘they’ don’t want it


9 posted on 07/09/2011 8:35:15 PM PDT by sten (fighting tyranny never goes out of style)
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To: Titus Quinctius Cincinnatus

Lasers don’t kill people; Siths kill people.


10 posted on 07/09/2011 8:38:12 PM PDT by FredZarguna (Titles are but nicknames, and every nickname is a Title. -- Thomas Paine)
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To: Blood of Tyrants

He is doing his best to run the price of crude up for them.... with a multi fold purpose, starving America for energy while bleeding Americas cash. Its whatever is necessary to bring down a nation. No drilling/ attack coal/no fracking/ no nuclear.....FUBO!


11 posted on 07/09/2011 8:39:13 PM PDT by himno hero ("Armageddon is well seeded, America will pay"... Barrack Obama's vision)
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To: jmcenanly

BTW, this isn’t new technology. The concept of inertial electrostatic confinement goes back to the 1920’s with vacuum tube research conducted by Irving Languir from General Electric. By the 1960’s Philo Farnsworth was producing equipment that would produce high quantities of neutrons from D-T reactions in what amounted to a large vacuum tube, in essence creating a miniature star in a bottle.


12 posted on 07/09/2011 8:46:38 PM PDT by factoryrat (We are the producers, the creators. Grow it, mine it, build it.)
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To: factoryrat
BTW, this isn’t new technology. The concept of inertial electrostatic confinement goes back to the 1920’s with vacuum tube research conducted by Irving Languir from General Electric. By the 1960’s Philo Farnsworth was producing equipment that would produce high quantities of neutrons from D-T reactions in what amounted to a large vacuum tube, in essence creating a miniature star in a bottle.

Unfortunately, like that carburator that that guy back in the 1970s developed that let a car get 800 miles to the gallon, the oil companies bought the patent and sat on it.

13 posted on 07/09/2011 8:56:58 PM PDT by Titus Quinctius Cincinnatus ("Armed forces abroad are of little value unless there is prudent counsel at home." - Cicero)
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To: jmcenanly

And, does it produce more energy than is consumed in producing the heat, are is this just a big expensive popcorn popper.


14 posted on 07/09/2011 9:11:33 PM PDT by org.whodat
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To: sten; Red Badger

Thanks for the ping, Red Badger.

And like Sten, I like the decentralization aspect of LENR.

This experiment reminds me of KP Sinha’s Laser experiment in LENR.
Laser stimulation of low-energy nuclear
reactions in deuterated palladium
http://www.ias.ac.in/currsci/oct102006/907.pdf


15 posted on 07/09/2011 9:11:37 PM PDT by Kevmo (Turning the Party over to the so-called moderates wouldn't make any sense at all. ~Ronald Reagan)
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To: FredZarguna

The Sith didn’t kill Alderaan, Tarkin was a big government Bureaucrat.


16 posted on 07/09/2011 9:30:58 PM PDT by omega4179
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To: jmcenanly

bttt


17 posted on 07/09/2011 9:38:12 PM PDT by TEXOKIE (Anarchy IS the strategy of the forces of darkness!)
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To: SirKit

Fusion ping!


18 posted on 07/10/2011 1:09:10 AM PDT by SuziQ
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To: jmcenanly

For me, the exciting aspect of this discovery is:

“Such a power plant is ideal for stationary electrical generation in a power station or for space propulsion.”

Those that really begin to exploit the solar system (mining, colonization and so forth) will be the winners of the 21st Century.

I hope most of them are of American origin, and not Chinese. I also hope the bulk of it is done by private entities, not governments. SpaceX is a good start - in fact if I was Elon Musk I’d immediately start an initiative to incubate this technology for interplanetary travel.

Imagine the coup if it were not a government, but a private company, that first landed humans on Mars...


19 posted on 07/10/2011 5:35:09 AM PDT by PreciousLiberty
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To: Red Badger

20 Mule Team Borax.

Death Valley Days with Ronald Reagan, I watched that as a kid.

A tiny bit of that borax mixed with some sugar water makes dirt cheap and highly effective ant poison.

I doubt the boron fusion thing will work, but it will be great if it does. Maybe we will actually have power too cheap to meter, like they used to promise.


20 posted on 07/10/2011 7:41:29 AM PDT by HangThemHigh (Entropy's not what it used to be.)
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