Neutron production rates by inverse-beta decay in fully ionized plasmas

Abstract

Recently we showed that the nuclear transmutation rates are largely overestimated in the Widom-Larsen theory of the so-called 'Low Energy Nuclear Reactions'. Here we show that unbound plasma electrons are even less likely to initiate nuclear transmutations.

Fully Ionized Plasmas and Nuclear Electron Capture Reactions

“…Most recently it has been predicted [7] that a cold plasma has a higher rate of electron capture than does a hot plasma. This has been predicted by Maiani on the basis of Debye screening of the attractive Coulomb interactions between the electron and the proton.…”

“…This prediction is in flagrant disagreement with experiments which exhibit hot plasma nuclear transmutations and do not exhibit cold plasma nuclear transmutations. It is nevertheless important to understand wherein the Maiani computation [7] fails theoretically.…”

“…In the erroneous calculation of Maiani [7], the classical Debye screening theory is applied in a regime wherein the theory is no longer valid; i.e. the conditions of Eq.…”