Mitigation of the Stopping Power Effect on Proton-Boron11 Nuclear Fusion Chain Reactions

Abstract

A proton beam with a velocity of the order of 10 9 cm/s is generated to interact with a charge neutral hydrogen-boron medium such as H 3 B. The created charged particles are confined by magnetic fields. This concept was the basis for a novel non-thermal fusion reactor, published recently in Laser and Particle Beams [1]. The fusion is initiated by protons followed by a process of chain reactions in a neutral medium density of the order of 10 19 cm −3 , heated by the pB 11 fusion created alphas up to a temperature of about one electron volt. In this system, the radiation losses by bremsstrahlung are negligible and the plasma thermal pressure is low. The ionization of the gaseous medium is caused by the alpha elastic nuclear collisions with the hydrogen atoms and their thermal heating and it is < 10 −4. An external electric field is applied to avoid the energy losses of the protons particles by friction, due to their interaction with the electrons of the medium, to keep the proton-boron fusion at the maximum cross section of about 600 keV at the center of mass frame of reference. The alphas created in the pB 11 fusion undergo nuclear elastic collisions with the hydrogen protons of the medium and causing a pB 11 chain reaction. In this paper the equation of motion of these proton and alphas are solved numerically for the one-dimensional (1D) case, and their possible solutions are analyzed and discussed. Specifically, it is shown how the electric field can mitigate the stopping power for the proton11-proton nuclear fusion. Our results show that starting from a bunch of 10 13 protons in our volume, an alpha number of particles of 6 × 10 16 was accepted after a 5 ms cycle of applying our specially designed electric field. Consequently, the medium temperature was raised to 1.3 eV. The aim of this paper is to present a new concept by addressing only the main physical processes and not to present a complete engineering design. The configuration for mitigating the stopping power and the numerical solution in this paper is novel and promises few applications with a viable proton-boron11 fusion reactions.

Analysis of the p-11B Fusion Scenario with Compensation of the Transfer of Kinetic Energy of Protons and Alpha Particles to the Gas Medium by the Electric Field

“…Eliezer et al [10] analyzed the situations when reaction (1) occurs in gaseous H 3 11 B or other hydride of 11 B with a density of 10 19 cm −3 or of the order of 10 19 cm −3 and temperature of about 1 eV or few eV. Ionization of this gas is supposed negligible [10].…”

“…is compensation should increase the probability of participation of the protons in reaction (1) and that of "useful" acceleration of protons due to the scattering of alpha particles on them. e magnetic field should provide the realization of these scenarios in reactors with acceptable sizes [9,10]. Below, it is shown that in the scenario proposed in [10], the ratio g of energy release of reaction (1) to the average value 〈W s 〉 of the energy spent for the initiation of one reaction (1) will be unacceptably low for power production.…”

“…e magnetic field should provide the realization of these scenarios in reactors with acceptable sizes [9,10]. Below, it is shown that in the scenario proposed in [10], the ratio g of energy release of reaction (1) to the average value 〈W s 〉 of the energy spent for the initiation of one reaction (1) will be unacceptably low for power production.…”

“…is discussed since 1973 [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12]. One of the chain reactions consists of the scattering of at least one of the three alpha particles, generated by reaction (1), on proton(s) with acceleration of the proton(s) to kinetic energies, corresponding to a relatively high cross-section σ 1 for reaction (1) and the subsequent participation of the accelerated proton(s) in this reaction [1,4,[6][7][8][9][10][11][12]. According to [1], at the temperature of 150-350 keV and the density of 10 16 -10 26 cm − 3 , this chain reaction and other "nonthermal" effects result in an increase in R 1 on 5-15%.…”

“…In 2020, Eliezer and Martinez-Val [9] and Eliezer et al [10] proposed p-11 B fusion scenarios with the influence of electric and magnetic fields on protons and alpha particles in the gas medium. e main idea of the proposal is that during some time periods, time-dependent electric field should compensate approximately for the transfer of kinetic energy ε p of a proton with ε p ≈ ε * p , where ε * p is ε p corresponding to the largest value of σ 1 for the collision of proton with the nucleus of 11 B in the rest, to the medium and for transfer of the kinetic energy of the alpha particle to the medium [9,10].…”