Creating and observing super-hot solid plasma could lead to a greater understanding of fusion processes
Posted 01.25.2012 at 1:54 pm
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SLAC Chamber This photograph shows the interior of a Linac Coherent Light Source SXR experimental chamber, set up for an investigation to create and measure a form of extreme, 2-million-degree matter known as “hot, dense matter.” The central part of the frame contains the holder for the material that will be converted by the powerful LCLS laser into hot, dense matter. To the left is an XUV spectrometer and to the right is a small red laser set up for alignment and positioning.
University of Oxford/Sam Vinko
In two separate studies, the world’s most powerful X-ray laser has been used to build the first atomic X-ray laser pulse, as well as to superheat and control a clump of 2-million-degree matter. The atomic laser could be used to watch biological molecules at work, while the creation of hot dense matter could be used to understand the processes of nuclear fusion.
Researchers at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory used the Linac Coherent Light Source, a rapid-fire X-ray laser, to flash-heat a small piece of aluminum foil and create a solid plasma known as hot dense matter. A team led by Sam Vinko, a postdoc at Oxford University, took the temperature of this matter — 2 million degrees Celsius, or 3.6 million degrees Fahrenheit — and the whole process took about a trillionth of a second. The measurements will lead to more accurate models of how hot dense matter forms and behaves. These models could help scientists understand — and maybe someday recreate — the process of nuclear fusion that fuels the sun, according to a news release from SLAC.
Scientists can create plasma from gases using conventional lasers, but you need a super-powerful laser to create a plasma from a solid material. The LCLS’ ultra-short wavelengths of light can penetrate a dense solid and look at it, all at the same time. The LCLS is underground in Palo Alto and covers a distance of a little more than a mile. It can create intense bursts of X-ray radiation more than a billion times brighter than any other laser source.
In a separate study, the LCLS was harnessed to build the first-ever atomic-scale X-ray laser, a feat that could open up a whole new field of atomic imaging.
Since the laser was invented more than 50 years ago, scientists have tried to lase at shorter wavelengths, but it’s difficult to do because shorter wavelengths require faster atom pumping. But free-electron lasers in the X-ray range can produce superfast pulses of intense energy, so this pumping is now feasible. Scientists from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory used the LCLS to give a pumped-up kick to a cluster of neon atoms. This knocked some electrons up to higher energy states and created a cascade of X-ray emissions — a mini atomic-sized laser.
The atomic laser’s light is much more pure, and its pulses are much shorter, so it could be used to tease out sharp details of atomic-scale interactions and phase changes that would otherwise be impossible to see.
Both papers were published today in Nature.
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Johnny, how many times have I told you NOT to put aluminum foil in the super X-Ray Laser machine!
Johnny: "Argh, foiled again!"
----------------
"Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." - Carl Sagan
"Max Planck scientist Rohringer and her colleagues from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and Colorado State University used the so-called free-electron laser LCLS at SLAC for their experiments. With strong magnets, free-electron lasers bring fast electrons accelerated by particle accelerators on a zigzag course, thus generating laser like radiation within the X-ray range. Unlike these, traditional optical lasers are based on the radiation of atoms which are excited to emit light by simulated emission. . So far, this was not possible in the X-ray range, because the excitation of atoms in this area requires very intensive radiation. With the LCLS, Rohringer and her team now created the first X-ray laser based on atoms – more than 40 years after the original concept was published.
Due to their short wave lengths, X-ray lasers are able to make atomic details visible and, with their ultra-short pulse duration, take snapshots of fast molecular processes. Thus, it may be possible to photograph the process of chemical reactions. The purer the colour of the laser and the shorter the X-ray burst, the sharper will be the image.
The scientists sent a short LCLS X-ray pulse of 40 to 80 femtoseconds (one femtosecond is one quadrillionth of a second) through a neon gas cell at high pressure. The X-ray beam cut a narrow channel through the gas, along which neon atoms were ionised. In this process, an inner-shell electron was kicked out of the atom, leaving a hole behind. Subsequently, one of the electrons of the outer shell filled up the hole in the inner shell, thereby emitting an X-ray pulse. According to the self-amplifying effect, this pulse stimulated the next atom to emit an X-ray pulse – an avalanche effect – so that the numerous pulses overlap and form one X-ray laser burst. The wavelength of this X-ray light was 1.46 nanometres (millionth of a millimetre). For comparison: most applied lasers in the optical range have a wavelength of 800 nanometres. The wavelength determines the size of the details which are still discernible in the corresponding light.
"
"Do not try and bend the spoon. That's impossible. Instead... only try to realize the truth. There is no spoon."
we can use this to shoot down asteroids.
"religion is like a prison for the seekers of wisdom"
-Killah Priest
The bigger the bug zapper, the more I am happier!!!
And as far as asteroids are concerned there old JediMindset of which we shared a few comments back and forth on. Blowing up an iron asteroid is hard. Pushing an asteroid sideways is hard too. But if I can get behind it and just give is a lot more speed, nature will take care of itself. Remember orbits are based upon the pull of gravity, mass of the object and the speed it is going. Just speed up that asteroid and it will been in a wide orbit or it may just head out to space on its own!
.............................
Science sees no further than what it can sense.
Religion sees beyond the senses.
Why Aluminum? they SPECIFICALLY said "hot DENSE matter", well, Aluminum is brittle, & exposing it to heat is going to obviously make it expand, so unless it was Aluminum that was treated somehow to be Abe to take all that heat & THEN IT ISN'T ALUMINUM, it's some variety of Aluminum Alloy....
I think powerful X-ray lasers will not be enough to harness the fusion energy. Without an efficient thermoelectric converter to recover the waste heat, the nuclear fusion will ever be 20 years away. On the other hand, electrostatic acceleration can easily reach much more than 3.6 million degrees with low power consumption. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uqnk19hn7Rc
The DOE sends out a press release about a laser that cost millions of dollars that could possibly be used for Hot Fusion and a weapon and it gets posted all over the internet. NASA speaks about Cold Fusion being real and Andrea Rossi makes a "Cold Fusion"( LENR) reactor that you could possibly buy next year for $500 to heat your home for $10 every six months and and its treated like a sideshow? Whats really going on?
Good thing they called it "hot dense matter" as "Cold fusion" was terrible flop.
"we can use this to shoot down asteroids." YES! so instead of red hot rocks blasting into the earth crust we will have SUPER red hot balls of plasma smashing into the earth crust!