reply to post by Jim_Kraken
the statement about the nuetron rods is not from erich its from the MIT's Plasma Science and Fusion Center ,
"Description: EPS teamed with MIT's Plasma Science and Fusion Center under an STTR grant to develop a theoretical framework and laboratory methods
for
reliably creating small (0.5-1.0 cm diameter) self-organized plasmas, called
"electron spiral toroids" (ESTs) or "spiral plasma toroids" (SPTs). EST
electrons travel in parallel orbits around a torus in densities sufficient
to create a stable, self-sustaining internal magnetic field. These novel
laboratory-level plasmas, whose physics resembles that of ball lightning,
are unusual in that they remain stable in partial atmospheres without
requiring external magnetic fields for their containment, yet can also be
accelerated in a directed fashion to potentially very high velocities (e.g.,
600 km/sec) and kinetic energies. Parallel work on formation and magnetic
acceleration of "compact toroids" is also underway at DoE's Livermore lab
and at Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) at Kirtland AFB, NM, although
these plasmas - which can only exist in vacuum - require large (multi-meter
long) machinery that uses magnetic field pressures associated with "Tokamak"
fusion reactors to create large-diameter (0.5-1.0 meter) plasmas, which must
then be greatly reduced in diameter and volume to be useful. By contrast,
EPS uses much smaller, cheaper hardware to repeatably generate
high-ion-density plasmas that have remained stable in air for up to 0.6
seconds at 1-Torr atmospheric pressures. The EPS/MIT work has drawn interest
from MDA and DTRA for DEW/KEW applications and from Delphi Corporation, a
major automotive electronics firm, which envisions an automotive mini-fusion
reactor that would collide two small toroids generated by 1-meter-long
"neutron tubes" and capture the heat from their collision."
secondly,do you think nasa would say,oh this was the nuetron rod we used to test helium three fusion potential on the moon!?