Horace,
I don't recall the mechanism you have suggested for CF extracting
energy from O18 interactions.
Good reason for that, as there is nothing firm or even gelled, which has
been vetted to any degree.
Some thoughts have been tossed out about very slow neutrons coming from
the distorted nucleus - which would be a metastable variety of 18O (the
posting called Newton's Cradle and Nuclear Sausage) which hypothesis
gathered many yawns (which may be a good thing).
But there are too many loose ends there to even proceed until more data
is available.
It just occurred to me that O has little interaction at the cathode, and none
inside the cathode. Wouldn't O18 interactions take place at an anode?
Mitchell Swartz indicated to me, and I hope my memory of this is not in
error - but he said that in the photo-enhanced version of his Phusor -
in the paper he presented in Boston, that the reaction seems to occur
outside the metal altogether. I should check that detail, as maybe I got
it wrong, and it could turn out to be important.
If O18 is involved in energy release in CF, then maybe it is involved in
energy release in polyethylene oxide (PEO) electrolyte batteries.
Yes - good point.
> The higher mass would make diffusion of the O18 slower than O16, so
it would
take longer to diffuse to and accumulate near the anode. Whoops, the
oxygen doesn't move in such batteries? It's stuck in the polyethylene
oxide?
Not really. Anytime there is mass exchange at the molecular level like
this, the isotopes interchange as if there was magically no chemical
bond at all!
This is demonstrated in any number of reactions where isotopes can be
traced. There is a term for it, which I cannot recall at the moment. If
time permits, I will supply some references later today.
Jones
