Paper: "A Technique for Making Nuclear Fusion in Solids" (Richard Wayte)

Thanks to Peter Gluck on his latest comment on the Ego Out site for pointing out an article by British researcher Richard Wayte that I hadn’t yet see, but is an interesting contribution to the body of LENR research. The article is titled “A Technique for Making Nuclear Fusion in Solids”.

The author has done numerous experiments using various chemicals. He has used a powdered deuteride (calcium, magnesium, strontium, barium, lithium and sodium) and mixes it red phosphorous, and with a transition metal. He has used manganese scandium, titanium, vanadium, chromium, iron, cobalt, nickel, copper, zinc, yttrium, zirconium, niobium, molybdenum and cadmium, and says he is able to see a nuclear fusion event, which is manifest in “hot spots” and explosions. He says that “repeatability is no longer a problem”, and thinks there should be a way to make this commercially useful.

The full text can be found here: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/294715828_A_Technique_for_Making_Nuclear_Fusion_in_Solids

Here are some excerpts:

Abstract

” A technique is described for making nuclear fusion at room temperature by compressing a powder mixture comprising a deuteride and catalytic material. The result is explosive beyond known chemical reaction for the materials. ”

Experimental description

“In the first experiments, about 200mg of the primary fuel powder was put in a compression cell which consisted of two EN31 chrome steel roller bearings (12mm x 12mm) as anvils in a mild steel sleeve, sealed 4 with a lead/tin solder ring to contain generated gases, see Figure 2a. When this cell was subjected to a vertical force of 30 tons in a press, the powder was formed into a hard solid disc, but no ignition occurred. The force was then removed so that a thin steel wedge could be placed underneath, before re-applying the force gradually. As a high force level was approached this time, it appeared that some shear occurred within the fuel pellet such that localised hot-spots [5,6,7] in the shear-plane ignited a chemical exothermic reaction which enabled the fusion process within the enclosed pressurised environment, causing an explosion in the cell.”

Hypothesis

“It is hypothesized that chemical and nuclear processes occur within the compressed fuel shear-plane hot-spots [5,6,7], which are high pressure plasma regions up to 1000oK. Here, ionised manganese and phosphorus may combine exothermically, yielding 104kJ/mol of MnP [11]. Nearby calcium deuteride, bound by 180kJ/mol 20 during its production [12], may now be dissociated by energetic phosphorus ions. Deuterium is thereby freed and calcium phosphide formed exothermically at 543kJ/mol [12], adding further energy to the hot pressurised plasma. Under pressure, freed deuterium atoms will occupy interstitial positions between surface atoms of manganese grains [13] where they are dynamically constrained while being bombarded by energetic deuterons in the plasma. At the same time, bombardment by energetic free electrons adds to the environment of manganese conduction/valence electrons and results in enough screening of the Coulomb force to enable fusion of the free and constrained deuterons.”

Conclusion

“A large number of experiments have been conducted with powdered material comprising a deuteride and catalyst. The technique is understood in terms of pressurised shearing hot-spots within which exothermic chemical reactions facilitate enough Coulombic screening for nuclear fusion of deuterons. Even a mixture of hydride and catalyst produces explosions, so this is a noteworthy phenomenon.”