EMC2 news

[Skipjack]

Depends on the CPU. Also, why not run it on the GPU?

[paperburn1]

Has anybody else heard rumors of Thailand looking real hard at polywell in the past few months at Ongkharak Nuclear Research Centre.

[paperburn1]

http://www.irs.uni-stuttgart.de/publika ... _final.pdf

Up up and away
The short-term goal for IEC development is to
promote the IEC thruster concept to TRL3 by the end of
2019. Several verification processes are required to
achieve this goal, such verification of IEC operation
characteristics, extracted plasma properties, and thrust
performance. Currently, tank 12 vacuum system is
prepared for testing of 1kW-scale EP device.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/a ... via%3Dihub
The NPR of the D–T fuel mixture with a 50%–50% ratio is approximately 250 times that of pure fuel. (in simulation)

[krenshala]

Interesting read.

Is it me, or does this design seem to be about where Dr. Bussard was about 15 to 20 years ago?

[paperburn1]

Has anybody else heard rumors of Thailand looking real hard at polywell in the past few months at Ongkharak Nuclear Research Centre.

Thailand has decided to go with china and a tokamak, partly because a lack of support from our government for polywell.
China donates its HT-6M tokamak to Thailand, fuelling China-Thai fusion exploration
https://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/opi ... actor-saga


at least our side is starting to wake up about fusion
At the behest of the U.S. Department of Energy, the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine released a plan in December 2018 for advancing fusion research whether or not the U.S. continues its participation in ITER. Although the report encourages continued U.S. participation in ITER, it also advocates for the creation of a national research program that can draw on ITER discoveries while ensuring that the U.S. can remain competitive in the energy landscape of the future.

[paulsheer]

added the patent info to wikipedia:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polywell#Going_public

[pdxpyro]

Interesting. In all my years of lurking on this site, I've never looked at the Wikipedia article. If I wanted to stay informed regarding fusion efforts (especially EMC2), I always visited, well . . . here! Thanks for the link below!

added the patent info to wikipedia:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polywell#Going_public

[Skipjack]

Looks like there is a small (and very young) Canadian team that is working on Polywell related research. Not sure what they will achieve, but given the lack of Polywell related news, this is at least somewhat refreshing:
https://www.progressivefusionsolution.com/

[choff]

Joel Rogers is the Chief Scientist, looks like it's in my backyard.

[paperburn1]

Notably hidden among the budget items for NASA was a $100 million allocation to develop a nuclear thermal rockets.
Does anybody know if polywell tried to get their fingers into that rice bowl?

[daveklingler]

Notably hidden among the budget items for NASA was a $100 million allocation to develop a nuclear thermal rockets.
Does anybody know if polywell tried to get their fingers into that rice bowl?

Not a community rice bowl, although there are other rice bowls specifically meant for the topic.

That program is specifically on track to develop a modernized Pewee-type fission NTR with testing scheduled in the next five years. It was started in 2010 by the Obama Administration and violently trimmed back by Congress to its present state, which arguably makes it a smaller political target.

In short, Obama asked NASA what they wanted for space exploration, they coughed up a list that's been around since the 1960's that included things like orbital propellant depots and reviving NERVA and flight-testing it, and that got submitted in the new budget blueprint in place of the glistening pork that was Constellation. Excrement hit the fan. The compromise 2010 Space Act allowed Congress to design its own rocket (SLS), and NASA got the Space Technology Program, which allows NASA to work on about a dozen items they've needed for fifty years to do anything serious. Orbital fueling has been considered verboten, because that's seen by Congress as a threat to SLS, but they were allowed to begin a very small NTR program which thankfully has not received enough attention to prevent it from progressing.

Note that NTRs have been the preferred engine in every single Mars Reference Mission since NERVA was certified for flight. Congress actually refused to allocate money for NERVA's Reactor In-Flight Test (RIFT), and the Nixon Administration caused a constitutional crisis by using NERVA and Apollo funding to permanently dismantle both programs shortly before Watergate.* At any rate, there's a small chance this program might be able to get back to where NERVA was before its dismantlement, in which case NASA will ask for funding to launch a new RIFT, at which point in time people will get hot and bothered about allowing neutrons into space.

Coincidentally this will all happen about 2023 or possibly 2024, which is when Trump has asked for a human return to the lunar surface to cap his second term. His arch-nemesis, Jeff Bezos, offered to make that happen yesterday with Blue Moon. So at about the time when we're about to start doing human landings using a spacecraft developed on Bezos' dime, NASA will be seriously making their case for NTR-powered missions to Mars.**

Fun, right?

* The constitutional crisis was resolved in the Supreme Court early in the Ford Administration; it turns out that when Congress allocates funds for a program the Administration isn't allowed to redirect those funds to dismantle the program. Go figure.

** And SpaceX may possibly be getting ready for a lunar mission with Starship.

[zbarlici]

China gets free tech... now there is a man tough to negotiate with.

You do realize that Tesla gave away all of their patents for free years ago? Also, from what I understand, the Chinese are putting quite a bit of their own money behind this as well.

...the damned psychopath prehistoric parasytes of the west willing to kill its own host to maintain their dying antequated tech empires. Musk is a hero. He built his fortunes on leaps in innovation, something the damned consumerist economy avoids as if it were cancer. 60 years plus these psycopaths buying up patents and burying them because it would make their trinkets too efficient or make them obsolete.(thank goodness for kickstarter... but i'm still waiting for some daring teams to stab the consumerist faggots in the eye by building tech designed to last forever) Gradual improvement, this year iphone ×, next year iphone x+1, with improvements barely noticeable, when they could do so much more.

The oil and the internal combustion engine psycopath oligarchs of the estabilished west are just two of the many industries that purposefully slow innovation to a frick crawl. Other economies grow out of poverty becaus3 they embrace innovation. While the vampiric psycopaths of the west would rather us die a slow, painful death, rather than give up on their cancerous empires.

[Taliesin]

I understand the frustration and the intent of this reply, but rarely do I see a reply like this on Talk-Polywell.

[Skipjack]

I understand the frustration and the intent of this reply, but rarely do I see a reply like this on Talk-Polywell.

Guess you have been avoiding the General section
I don't go there anymore.

[Skipjack]

The Fusion Podcast - Dr Jaeyoung Park
https://youtu.be/ppgdT3SQMhI