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- Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
- Path: sparky!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!sun-barr!ames!pacbell.com!tandem!zorch!fusion
- From: blue@nscl01.nscl.msu.edu
- Subject: Untruthes about GeV Particles
- Message-ID: <0095FAAB.36CDDB20.14429@dancer.nscl.msu.edu>
- Sender: scott@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG (Scott Hazen Mueller)
- Reply-To: blue@nscl01.nscl.msu.edu
- Organization: Sci.physics.fusion/Mail Gateway
- Date: Wed, 26 Aug 1992 15:43:55 GMT
- Lines: 28
-
- Jed Rothwell, as spokesman for the Brightsen-Mallove theory, has made
- the assertion that 3He particles at multiGeV particles would not be
- detected with the kinds of detection equipment that has been employed
- around cold fusion experiments. This is NOT TRUE! To make the issue
- clear cut we need a firm estimate of the flux that is supposed to have
- gone undetected for lo these many years. Information contained in
- Tom Droege's note on this question leads me to an estimate of something
- like 10^10 reactions per second for each watt of output. Feel free to
- revise this by several orders of magnitude as it won't effect what I
- have to say. Very energetic charged particles loose energy through
- two processes, collisions with atomic electrons and nuclear collisions.
- For more ordinary energies in the MeV range the atomic collisions
- dominate, but the rate of slowing decreases with increasing energy so
- the signal in a detector gets smaller. That is the effect B-M-R are
- counting on, but there is a clinker in their arguement. The nuclear
- collisions become relatively more significant, and believe me you
- don't hide what happens when you have a nuclear collision at GeV
- energies. This is what we study here at the National Superconducting
- Cyclotron Lab, in case you wondered what NSCL refers to. Just to
- mention one possible way the slow down of the "cosmic-ray-like
- particles" make themselves know. They produce a cascade of high-energy
- neutrons. We detect those suckers by putting up a block of ordinary
- aluminum which in an hour at the kind of fluxes we have here will be
- very radioactive such that any simple gamma detector could sense it.
- 'Nuff said?
-
- Dick Blue
- NSCL @ MSU
-