Fusion : Getting too technical

This is an extract from an email my brother sent me. I promise that it
is the last I shall mention on this subject.
Any mistakes in this are his fault and his fault alone. Any hate mail
you wish to send him as a result of this can go directly to
[address removed from this website at Andrew's request]


Fusion is theoretically possible with just hydrogen. This excludes
the
heavier isotopes deuterium and helium. Two protons will combine to form
a 2H
2+ ion. This will then decay losing a positron to become deuterium.
This
deuterium can then fuse with another proton to form helium 3 and so on.
THe
presence of helium is not necessary, although this is a very high energy
(even
for fusion) reaction. A much easier route is the combining of two
deuterium
nuclei to form helium 4. Still no helium is necessary, but it is
emitted as
an exhaust product. You are probably more familiar with the carbon,
nitrogen,
oxygen cycle than me, but I think this needs even more energy. Tritium
is an
even more preferable fuel if it can be used before it decays into helium
3.

That's it. No more from me on this subject.

Wren A <A.Wren@> wrote:
He doesn't mean "ion" he means "unstable nucleus". But this reaction
is actually far more useful from an engineering point of view. The
energy produced by the hydrogen-hydrogen interaction is moderate,
(spelled c-o-n-t-r-o-l-l-a-b-l-e) and if you can get the things to
actually bump together (protons are weeny) then the resulting deuterium
is non-radioactive. The positrons can be stored, ducted away or used
locally. Most of the energy comes from the positron annihilating an
electron. You will also notice that using this positron flux to heat
a gas is compatible with our "air intakes", and is also an "antimatter
drive" as beloved of so many SF writers.

This system also has the great advantage that, when you turn it off,
it isn't full of filthy radioisotopes. So that's "environmentally
friendly nuclear power" to you and me. Although NASA has worked on
several nuclear powered rockets (Orion and NERVA, for instance) they
have all had justified protests from the environmental groups, and had
their budgets terminated. Orion, of course, violated assorted
anti-nuclear-testing treaties, and since the US are marginally better
on the moral front than the French, that was the end of that.


Simon

---
"This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind" -Ecclesiastes 4:16

simon@ | Not affiliated to any religion
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"I have been asked to point out, as if you couldn't guess, that my rantings
are not the opinions of One Chip Solutions. So now you know, don't you..?"

possible.

Just trying to keep the argument going. Anyway, my contributions came
with a disclaimer. I take no responsibility for boring you.
There is a newsgroup at alt.wesley.crusher.die.die.die but I know of no
website. However, it is very quiet and mostly made up of get rich quick
scams.

Andrew the boring ranter.

Before I start Andrew (t.i.r) I ought to point out that forwarding peoples
private emails to newsgroups without their permision is a good way of

a) Getting their eternal hate.
b) Getting your sys admin to pull your account if they complain.

Course thats less likely to happen at RHUL, but the principle still holds.

That said now that it's here, I'll comment on it.
Well unless I'm much mistaken, he's Andrew, I'm Adam. I won't take offense
unless you attack me down the pub for "boring us with technical stuff".
In which case I'll soundly thrash you to within an inch of your life.
I for one found it interesting. Okay I glazed over a tad on one post, but
that was cos I've seen it so many times before...
In a word, bollox. Technobable is NOT necessary to make a plot work. Look
at Babylon 5 for example. I can't think of any sci-fi books that contain
any. The only place you see it crop up is Star Trek, and other derivative
american TV shows. In actual fact the oposite is generally true, technobable
usually detracts from the plot. As in, oops we should kill off the entire
crew given the situation, but with a few bits of sticky back plaster, a
tachyon field and Geordies visor and bobs your Uncle, disaster averted.

Anyway the main point of the thread was that that the ships could probably
work as shown. Not that technobable should be "decrypted".

Oops I'm ranting again aren't I. I'll just go and take a sedative.

Later,

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Adam Hattrell, Support, Cimio Ltd. adam@