| Muon-catalyzed Fusion |
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Information AboutMuon-catalyzed Fusion |
| CATEGORIES ABOUT MUON-CATALYZED FUSION | |
| nuclear fusion | |
| SHOPPER'S DELIGHT | |
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In muon-catalyzed fusion, Deuterium and Tritium nuclei form atoms with Muon s, which are essentially heavy Electron s. The muons orbit very close to the nuclei, shielding the positive charge of the nuclei and allowing them to move close enough to fuse. The muons survive the fusion reactions and remain available to Catalyze further fusions. Andrei Sakharov and F. C. Frank predicted this effect of muon-catalyzed fusion on theoretical grounds before 1950 . One practical problem with the process is that muons are unstable, decaying in 2.2 microseconds while at rest. Hence there needs to be some cheap means of producing muons, and the muons must be arranged to catalyze as many reactions as possible before decaying. Another problem, recognized by J.D. Jackson in his seminal 1957 paper, is the approximately 1% probability of the muon "sticking" to the Alpha Particle (a helium-4 nucleus) that results from the deuterium-tritium fusion, removing it from the catalysis process. Even if muons were absolutely stable, each could catalyze, on average, only about 100 fusions before sticking—about one fifth the number needed to produce more energy than is consumed to produce the muons. Clearly, muon-catalyzed fusion is impractical without an efficient method of producing muons. REFERENCES
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