The Thunderbird reactor
A scientific controversy with decades and a small bench device at the University of British Columbia (UBC) may be the key to more efficient melting reactors, increasing the hypotheses of a nuclear reaction.
In March 1989two the electrochemicals surprised the world with the announcement that they had essentially managed to perform nuclear fusion in a glass bottle.
Martin Fleischmann e Stanley Pons claimed that through a simple glass container full of heavy water, in which they were inserted a palladium cathode and a platinum anodeThey managed, by electrolysis, to make Deurse’s atoms founded inside the crystal chain of the Paladium.
It was amazing news. If confirmed, it would have revolutionized the world, making the melting energy available in a small package. But It was too good to be true and for a good reason.
It was found that the work of the two men was extremely careless, impossible to reproduce and based on all kinds of assumptions and errors. At the end of the year, the cold fusion bubble had built, the technology was discredited and the concept relegated to the category of “bad fiction” and “conspiracy theories.”
It was really a scientific scandal.
However, a study at the end of August in Nature seems to have this technique resurrected. The palladium in a nuclear fusion bottle was revived, but in a different form.
As details A, one of the problems of nuclear fusion is to begin the reaction, which requires a high concentration of the deuterium hydrogen isotope. It is a process that in itself can be energetically intensive.
But the UBC interdisciplinary team resorted to an electrochemical process involving Palladium to enhance things.
What they did was build a target made of Palladium and, on one side, exposed him to an electrochemical reactor named Thunderbird reactor. This generated a plasma field that carried one side of the target with deuterium. However, the other side of the target was subjected to another electrochemical cell that added more deuterium.
The ingenious part is that by following the electrochemistry, the team reported that they were able to use only one Volt of electricity to carry both deuterium and normally required 800 pressure atmospheres using conventional methods.
Given that melting reactions depend on the melting of deuterium atoms, this overload has greatly increased the likelies of this to happen, on average by 15%. Although it has not produced a liquid energy gain, the team believes this opens new ways to revolutionize practical fusion energy.
In addition, the team made it clear that The experience is reproducible And unlike the 1989 experiences, he confirmed the results through neutrons issuance and not just a mere rise in heat, as had happened in the 80’s failed attempt.
“We hope this work will help bring the science of fusion out of the giants national laboratories and for the laboratory bench”Said the corresponding author of the article, Curtis P. Berlinguettein New Atlas.
“Our approach brings together nuclear fusion, material science and electrochemistry to create a platform where both fuel loading methods and target materials can be systematically adjusted. We see it as a starting point-which invites the community to iterate, refine and develop in the spirit of open and rigorous research,” he adds.
