FRC+IEC ?

[GIThruster]

They also got quite some substantial funding from Paul Allen, IIRC.
The question is, if this patent is just another baseless attempt, as you say.
What have they been so secretive about the past years?

I think the notion of T-A being particularly secretive is a little overstated. IIRC, they started with $12m in support from Paul Allen and another investor and later added $40m, all private investment. Private investors do not have the same reasons to share their accomplishments that those supported by public funds do. So long as the investors understand what's going on well enough to know they're not being flim-flammed, they're happy to keep things quiet. You can bet the investors in T-A have their own hired guns to be sure they're not being scammed, so the quiet makes sense.

Without the FOIA, we probably wouldn't know much about the Poly just because the Navy doesn't have a stake in making the research public. Others who have trouble getting funding like Lerner, are forced to be very public. Still others like Woodward, have a revulsion toward private science so do everything very publicly but even this has other reasons. By going very public, one can hope to avoid classification if a project succeeds.

Just saying, I think T-A often gets accused of poor intentions when really, keeping their work quiet seems very natural given the work they do and the competition they have. It's not like a national lab. Those investors hope to make a bundle. Why share any expertise they have and hand away the hoped-for prize?

[Skipjack]

Oh, I am not saying that them being secretive is necessarily a bad thing. They are a private company and they may publish as much, or as little information as they like.
I was just referring to the fact that they announced that they would announce something major later this year. If you build up a hype like that, you better have something to show, or you loose credibility.
So, I was wondering, what the announcement could be about and whether it could have anything to do with the patent.
I dont understand why you think that I implied that being secretive is necessarily a negative thing?

[GIThruster]

I didn't think you implied it was negative, Skip.

[D Tibbets]

I wonder if any of my musings apply to their system?

I don't think your musings apply to any systems. It is just not how plasmas work. They behave in an ambipolar fashion, and at fusion temperatures the ambipolar transport is very quick such that there never is any 'splitting' of plasma.

A plasma being transported through a magnetic field does develop a polarisation, but it is very small [compared with the scale of IEC devices] and is a continuum rather than a separation.

Of course there is splitting of plasma (I think ), how else would an ion engine, ion gun, or perhaps electron gun work?

And one of the arguments is that the Polywell does this in the cusps (it's not ambipolar). Of course, a plasma will be neutral or quasineutral without some external force creating a seperation. And, in at least two texts, they mention that fusion plasmas are losely coupled- meaning that global conditions dominates over local coulomb forces.

How is that possible with debye shielding, you might ask? Well, my idiots answer is that every definition of debye length that I have seen applies to a special condition and are essentially steaty state (in equalibrium). To calculate it you have to assume a tiny current flow just above zero. Such conditions would exist in an isolated plasma within quasineutral limits (in fact I'm guessing that is how the quasineutral limits are calculated). But, once significant current flow exists the situation is more dynamic and unpredictable(?). I have not seen how these biased and dynamic conditions effects the debye calculation. Is it a little longer, a lot longer, meaningless?

I'm assumeing your statement about slight polarization in a magnetic field is true for steady state fields, but does rapid intermittant pulsations ( say in the gigahertz range) have a inertia based effect on different partiicles (at least for a temperary amount of time). I'm thinking a cyclotron would be an example. If the magnetic field switching stays in sync with a charged particle, it can be continually accelerated, if not, the particle stalls. Or, am I confusing this with electrical fields?

Or perhaps a mass spectrometer might be a better example- wider orbits in a magnetic field with higher inertia. In this case the inertia (acceleration) is driven by electrical fields. Magnetic fields do not create acceleration, only deflections. That is one reason my speculations are shakey. If they indeed claim seperating electrons with a tuned magnetic field, it has to be based on some deflection that is not equal between the ions and electrons.

Dan Tibbets

[kcdodd]

Ambipolarity itself depends on an electric field existing in the plasma. Electrons move about 100 times faster then ions at the same energy. So, whatever will happen to the plasma, will happen to the electrons first. Take an open magnetic field line. Electrons stream out until a large positive potential is created. 100x that time scale later the ions will be pushed out.

Now, this statement about electro statically confining the electrons: that is what happens in ambipolarity! Electrons cannot stream out past a certain limit until the ions catch up. They basically dance around the ions like little children saying come on, come on. Why? Because of the electric field they created. Whatever is transporting the electrons out will be tampered by the field the transport creates, then retarding electron transport and increasing ion transport. If you can confine one or the other with this electric field in place then of course problem is solved. I would add this is a basic property of plasma and shouldn't be patentable in the first place.

[TallDave]

Skip,

My guess is they will release some kind of a neutron-source product, well short of net power but interesting, perhaps useful for treating radioactive waste.

Something to understand about VC: generally they will NOT fund basic research, they need something productizable. Now, Paul Allen also paid for a very large radio telescope, so who knows, he may view TriAlpha as being as much science project as investment. But if there are weaker hands in the funding mix, they will either get a product in the next few years or start complaining about minority shareholders' rights.

[Skipjack]

Yeah, I was thinking about them having a neutron source for a hybrid reactor, but then that would not make them much different from Helion. They may be a bit ahead in the game though.
Still, this is all veeeery confusing for me. Lots of supposedly nonsical patents, lots of money, an ominous announcement of an announcement.
I cant wait until - what was it- autumn?
Well, we will all see.

[D Tibbets]

Ambipolarity itself depends on an electric field existing in the plasma. Electrons move about 100 times faster then ions at the same energy. So, whatever will happen to the plasma, will happen to the electrons first. Take an open magnetic field line. Electrons stream out until a large positive potential is created. 100x that time scale later the ions will be pushed out.

Now, this statement about electro statically confining the electrons: that is what happens in ambipolarity! Electrons cannot stream out past a certain limit until the ions catch up. They basically dance around the ions like little children saying come on, come on. Why? Because of the electric field they created. Whatever is transporting the electrons out will be tampered by the field the transport creates, then retarding electron transport and increasing ion transport. If you can confine one or the other with this electric field in place then of course problem is solved. I would add this is a basic property of plasma and shouldn't be patentable in the first place.

I guess that is one way of describing without using the term debye shielding. The description I read in a text used an example of a neutral plasma suddenly exposed to a ground. Because of inertia, the electrons will start draing to ground first, but very quickly a potential develops that resists this non ambipolar flow so that the flow after that first instant is ambipolar. But, in the Polywall this debye shielding is opposed by the continuous injection of excess electrons. That is why the electrons continue to flow out in excess compared to the ions (non ambipolar), basically because the electrons are flowing into the system faster. To me it seems reasonable that the cusp flows are not ambipolar in the Polywell, and that arguing otherwise is violating arguments against unlimited charge buildup. Questions of whether this non neutral plasma can be maintained at acceptable costs is another matter...

How this applies to the Tri- Alpha FRC-IEC. I don't know. though charge separation does not necessarily mean net flow out of the system ( since I do not think the FRC has cusps (?)). The separation may be vary small, like the polarity Chrismb mentioned, and transient, but with high frequency this polarity might be maintained at some cost in energy. but the net benefit, if any, depends on what this is doing- increasing ion containment/ decreasing turbulence, preventing thermalization by cooling the electrons or slowing the upscattering of the ions, etc, etc.

Dan Tibbets

[kcdodd]

Right, the idea of polywell is inverse of natural ambipolar transport. Somehow you get an excess of electrons instead of a deficiency, which creates a negative well, and will tend to transport the ions into the core.

[rcain]

... some diagrams sure would help on that patent app....

Go to pat2pdf.org and type in the patent number; "7180242".

All shall then be revealed to you!
...

thanks Chris, that helps, a bit.

still cant quite work it out, seems like bit of a mishmash, though the maths workings look quite thorough.

no citation/mention of Lerner there.

i'll ponder it some more.

wonder prescisely which machine tey ended up building, if any. and why we havent heared more. patent assignee is Uni Calif.

[Skipjack]

Hmm, maybe they are doing all these patents to throw the competition off track?

[D Tibbets]

Something related to what Tri-Alpha is doing?

http://www-naweb.iaea.org/napc/physics/ ... _p6-46.pdf

Dan Tibbets