On Jul 16, 2009, at 6:50 AM, Jones Beene wrote:
-----Original Message-----
From: mix...@bigpond.com
I get 120 mg/cm^2 which results in an energy loss of 36 MeV, more
than
enough to
stop them. (100 micron is 100x10^-6 m, not 100 x 10^-6 cm).
This may be true, as far as it goes, but it still seems to missing the
forest for the trees.
Every "stop" or elastic collision is a high energy transfer event,
and the
thermodynamics of this kind of cascade are well known for fifty
years - and
will average to about one MeV or less in gamma radiation per elastic
collision. The combined 24-50 collisions or more will create a
gigantic and
easily detected radiation signature that would be impossible to
hide, if it
was there.
Almost all Alphas are stopped by thousands of interactions with
electrons. This is why attenuation is almost strictly a function of
electron density. There are comparatively few heavy particle collisions.
The emission rate for alphas in CF experiments is very low. Some
CR-39 exposures have only a few dozen per mm^2, for a two week
experiment. This kind of emission rate can be difficult to
distinguish from cosmic ray initiated background. This shows the
strengths of an integrating and particle type discriminating detector
like CR-39, vs particle counters, for low activity experiments.
That said, it is also true that SPAWAR noted CR-39 surface damage
that might possibly be attributed to x-rays, and if so, it would have
been a *lot* of x-rays, much more than Bremsstrahlung from the
detected alphas. I don't know if that was ever resolved as chemical
or mechanical damage by the control experiments. I know the alpha
tracks were resolved as non-artifacts.
Even if the (Peter Hagelstein et al) "magic phonon cascade"
hypothesis were
operable, and there is zero evidence for that hypothesis in all of
physics,
it could not be an "absolute phenomenon" that would eliminate the
significant probability of the normal and expected situation, and
some of
the signature should still be there.
It is not there, in a significant way.
ERGO there are few 24 MeV alphas, and probably no TSC - at least
not in the
way it has been presented thus far.
... there is helium, so all this is saying is that for the large
amount of
excess heat seen, it cannot be attributed to high energy alphas.
Jones
Agreed on that.
Best regards,
Horace Heffner
http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/
