Ref: The two patents of Wm. Barker
U.S. Pat. No. 4,961,880 "Electrostatic Voltage Excitation Process and
Apparatus" issued to William Barker in 1990 discloses an apparatus for
utilizing electrostatic charge, in long-term irradiation, to accelerate
the decay rate of some radioisotopes.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,076,971 entitled "Method of Enhancing Alpha Decay in
Radioactive Materials" issued to Barker in 1991, discloses a similar
method and apparatus.
Electrostatic fields are generally not sufficient to influence decay
rates, nor other nuclear reactions, at least not in pure elements; but
they (or RF HV from a Tesla-type device) can be surprisingly effective
to change the decay rate (not always an increase) in *some minerals* by
a factor of up to 10^6. This does not work for every mineral but for
unknown reasons the effect (change in counts) is almost unbelievably
accelerated - before and after irradiation. BTW the mineral which best
illustrates this effect is pitchblende. Before 9/11 it and other
candidate minerals were sold on eBay - but do not try to buy it these
days unless you want a visit from the MIB.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pitchblende
I am of the belief that this technique only works with mixed oxides, and
possibly best with slightly reduced oxides which have a tiny trace of
radium, or past radium contact - for whatever reason. I know, sounds too
bizarre to even mention this (in mixed company).
In what is (hopefully) the last in this series of speculative postings
on the recent history of "irreproducible results" in the field of
alternative energy involving element-56 *barium* this post will focus on
one possible way of "conditioning" active material for magnetic cores,
using a variant of the above Barker patents.
BTW I hope this does not turn out to be a candidate for the "Pullet
Prize" (a 'pullet' being 'southern' for a young turkey or chicken)
http://www.jir.com/pullet.html
The bottom line of this inquiry suggest the (remote) possibility that a
form of LENR was witnessed 20 years ago (by the fortuitous discovery of
F. Sweet and later by McLain/Wootan in a different device), but both of
these failed to make it to the stage of reliable prototype.
The 'remoteness' of this scenario being true is counterbalanced by the
extreme value to society, if it can be perfected using a better
understanding of the situation. Can any industrious inventor paddle
upstream against conventional-wisdom and "do the impossible" at this
stage? Actually, since we are talking LENR, this is not technically the
impossible goal of "free energy," just a more elegant form of LENR
conversion.
Basically in both cases above, the prior inventors may have stumbled
blindly onto "something" which looked like magnetic resonance, but they
could get no further than that -- because the effect was not
reproducible by themselves or others. And this gets back to the problem
that the underlying modality (energy source) was "miss-diagnosed" as
being related to ZPE or something else by the theorists and other
self-appointed experts who got into act later. Since the observers may
have missed the real modality and energy source, they would also have
missed the critical points about the 'conditioning' process.
A newer, unproven (and ... cough, cough...highly presumptuous)
hypothesis, which has the advantage of being more easily falsifiable, is
that instead of the energy source being ZPE - it is in fact "nuclear" in
the sense of IPE.
A short explanation of IPE - a being a variety of LENR - was offered in
previous postings. For success in a VTA or MRA type of device under this
scenario - well, apparently it once depended on finding a barium core or
resonator being previously "activated". This may happen naturally or not
(assuming that the Mu neutrino flux is the culprit). After use in a
device undergoing energy extraction, the active material is gone in a
few days unless it is renergized or "conditioned". The situation may be
that the isotopic isomer known as 135mBa is more or less regenerated in
situ from 135Ba (6% of natural) by operation of the device itself...
... or possibly, also in a conditioning process enhanced the effects of
the Barker Patents above, as HV may be interacting with the solar
neutrino flux, for instance.
It is possible (assuming the device worked at all) that in a correct
implementation, energy extraction also results in self-activation of
isomeric state via the mu neutrino. As we know the solar neutrino flux
is vast, beyond the imagination really - AND diurnal. There is evidence
that the Sweet device was diurnal too, and the Mu neutrino happens to be
in the energy range which would be able to activate the isomer. This all
could be predicated on neutrino oscillation and the fact that HV serves
to focus or set the flavor-changing process into motion.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neutrino_oscillation
Now, no one knows how or why the Barker patents work, or whether the
neutrino is involved there but they have been replicated by many. I do
not know yet if the same technique will work on a barium core, but it
seems remotely possible (probability > 0) that this is what happened
'hot-or-miss' in the past.
If so, then the practitioners may have failed to realize that the
conditioning period needs to be excruciatingly long - in excess of 24
hours and preferably greater than 100 hours, under either constant
electrostatic (Barker) irradiation or via RF HV from a Tesla (Oudin)
setup which technically is not static.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oudin_coil
My hope with this collection of long-winded posts is to encourage a
range of experiments with variants of Barker - applied to VTA-MRA
devices, esp. since it is easy to do. Hopefully a few Aggies or Owls
under Richard's tutelage will jump into the fray, despite the fact that
both the Sweet VTA and McClain/Wootan MRA are viewed skeptically today
(even on Vo) as devices which were little more than measurement error.
Maybe so.... or maybe they were not technically OU but did work on
occasion as LENR devices <g>.
Jones
