All our work
has been focused on naturally occurring fission reactions and living with the
consequences. Here we have an empirical
result that questions the present theoretical regime and we need to ask what is
next?
We have
learned what we have learned by hurling neutrons mostly at speeds sufficient to
overcome the electrostatic potential of the target. Now we have an unusual alternative outcome
that is unpredicted in our modeling.
There could
be a whole range of very low probability events in play that could completely
reshape our knowledge of the detail. One
should not think that what we have is anything more than a good approximation
to the empirical data that is likely to run foul of the facts as has just
happened.
Cold fusion,
by the way, is a strong hint.
The
electrostatic fields are not necessarily continuous or mathematically convenient
and many good questions have never been asked let alone answered in the
lab. I thought cold fusion was an
apparatus able to ask and answer some of those questions. Other similar apparatus need to be
fabricated.
Wouldn’t it
be lovely to be able to move a low speed neutron along an axis to direct
contact with an elemental nucleus at a specified location? If we ever pull that off, then perhaps we
know something that can be trusted about the nucleus.
Nuclear reaction defies expectations
Dec 10, 2010
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