Word: tritium
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...intended to become a nuclear scientist, but a few introductory courses at Atlanta's Emory University convinced him otherwise. He majored in economics, spent five years as an Air Force pilot and held down various jobs. His first contribution to the Progressive, a 3,400-word piece on tritium, a form of hydrogen used in H-bombs, appeared in February...
...steps on that ascent was the realization that the conditions of temperature and density necessary for the sustained fusion of ordinary hydrogen nuclei were far beyond the present capabilities of science. But experiments showed that it was easier to fuse two isotopes, or different forms, of hydrogen: deuterium and tritium. Reason: the nuclei of these isotopes have larger cross sections than those of ordinary hydrogen nuclei. Thus the probability of direct collisions between them is increased and that in turn means that less extreme conditions are required to make them fuse. The easiest fusion to attain, scientists determined, was between...
Tiny Bombs. Still, to join enough deuterium and tritium nuclei to sustain a fusion reaction requires heroic efforts. Deuterium-tritium gas mixtures must be heated to as much as 100 million degrees Celsius and be maintained at that temperature for about one second at a density of about 1014 (100 trillion) particles per cubic centimeter. Scientists have taken two different routes in their efforts to achieve these critical conditions. One is to use a "magnetic bottle" -an enclosing magnetic field-to contain the hydrogen fuel. The other is to use lasers or electron beams to make miniature hydrogen "bombs...
...magnetic technique takes advantage of a phenomenon that occurs when a deuterium-tritium mixture, or any other gas, is heated to an extremely high temperature: the atoms of gas are stripped of their electrons. The gas thus becomes a "plasma"-a mixture of negatively charged electrons and positively charged nuclei, or ions. Because these charged particles will not generally cross magnetic lines of force, they can be confined by a powerful magnetic field. The magnetic bottle is the only known practical container in which fusion can be sustained for any significant amount of time. If a plasma were to come...
Other groups of scientists are placing their bets on a different technique: "inertial confinement." This process involves the high-power laser or electron-beam bombardment of tiny pellets crammed with deuterium and tritium. The sudden application of the energetic beams causes instant vaporization, or boiling away, of the outer surface of the sphere. As the pellet coating flies outward, it pushes back against the deuterium and tritium, compressing and heating the mixture. If the impinging beams are energetic enough, the effect will be so great that the nuclei will fuse, releasing energy like a miniature H-bomb. Among others, researchers...