Posted on 03/08/2006 2:50:47 PM PST by The_Victor
Scientists have produced superheated gas exceeding temperatures of 2 billion degrees Kelvin, or 3.6 billion degrees Fahrenheit.
This is hotter than the interior of our Sun, which is about 15 million degrees Kelvin, and also hotter than any previous temperature ever achieved on Earth, they say.
They don't know how they did it.
The feat was accomplished in the Z machine at Sandia National Laboratories.
"At first, we were disbelieving," said project leader Chris Deeney. "We repeated the experiment many times to make sure we had a true result."
Thermonuclear explosions are estimated to reach only tens to hundreds of millions of degrees Kelvin; other nuclear fusion experiments have achieved temperatures of about 500 million degrees Kelvin, said a spokesperson at the lab.
The achievement was detailed in the Feb. 24 issue of the journal Physical Review Letters.
The Z machine is the largest X-ray generator in the world. It’s designed to test materials under extreme temperatures and pressures. It works by releasing 20 million amps of electricity into a vertical array of very fine tungsten wires. The wires dissolve into a cloud of charged particles, a superheated gas called plasma.
A very strong magnetic field compresses the plasma into the thickness of a pencil lead. This causes the plasma to release energy in the form of X-rays, but the X-rays are usually only several million degrees.
Sandia researchers still aren’t sure how the machine achieved the new record. Part of it is probably due to the replacement of the tungsten steel wires with slightly thicker steel wires, which allow the plasma ions to travel faster and thus achieve higher temperatures.
One thing that puzzles scientists is that the high temperature was achieved after the plasma’s ions should have been losing energy and cooling. Also, when the high temperature was achieved, the Z machine was releasing more energy than was originally put in, something that usually occurs only in nuclear reactions.
Sandia consultant Malcolm Haines theorizes that some unknown energy source is involved, which is providing the machine with an extra jolt of energy just as the plasma ions are beginning to slow down.
mmmm.....buffalo....mmmmm....(drool)
Paris Hilton was heard to say, "That's hot".
They will be....
But have they been been in Ft. Irwin, CA in the Summer time!
Now THAT's hot.
Funny what you stumble on. Like the Edison effect, the inventor's only contribution to basic science.
but will it light a cigarette?
Exactly. It's depressing that all they've done is duplicate the results Texas A&M got in 2001 using a dense plasma focus device. It's even more depressing that the A&M crew did it on about $80,000 in research funding; the Z Machine's got to cost in the millions.
WalMart is after the sales rights.
One thing that puzzles scientists is that the high temperature was achieved after the plasma’s ions should have been losing energy and cooling. Also, when the high temperature was achieved, the Z machine was releasing more energy than was originally put in, something that usually occurs only in nuclear reactions.
of course you know this is exactly how the sun got started, are they going to repeat history again?
"How did it not melt everything in sight?"
- High temperature plasma can only be constrained with strong magnetic fields. It’s complicated in practice but not in theory. Try pushing the positive ends of two magnets against each other. You will notice them repelling each other. Then think of making a container with the positive end of magnets all facing inward. Plasma is made of charged ions…meaning they have polarity + or -. If you place + polarity charged ions into a container of + charged magnetic field, the sides will repel the plasma and suspend it (floating) away from the sides of the container. It is necessary to keep the plasma away from solid material due to the extreme high temperatures otherwise the plasma would do exactly what you said and “melt everything in sight”.
My Bad!
Somebody call Hillary... this lab is challenging her talent at producing hot air.
"Come on baby light my fire".
Gonna need some SPF 10000 to work in that lab.
This is big news.
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