Chapter 594 The Technical Route Is Clear!

Office of the Dean of the Institute for Advanced Study.

Seeing Yang Xu who opened the door and walked in, Lu Zhou stopped the pen in his hand and cast him a questioning look.

"Is the analysis result out?"

He took out a USB flash drive from his pocket and put it on Lu Zhou's desk. Yang Xu said, "All the information is in it."

Lu Zhou continued to ask, "Where's the original?"

Yang Xu: "It has been backed up to the database...is there any problem?"

Lu Zhou: "Destroy it."

Yang Xu was slightly taken aback, but he didn't ask why, he just nodded.

"OK."

Seeing the office door close again, Lu Zhou connected the USB flash drive to the laptop, clicked on the folder, and carefully observed the pictures one by one.

After coming out of the underground laboratory yesterday morning, he took a few fragments taken from the arc-shaped double-layer structure between the fuel tank and the temperature exchanger, and took them to Yang Xu to make infrared spectrum characteristic peaks. analyzed and photographed with a transmission electron microscope.

Judging from the situation in several pictures, his guess was indeed confirmed.

Although the broken nano-ceramic composite material has been brittle, it is difficult to infer the original structural characteristics, but from the carbon residue inside it, it can be concluded that it is some kind of composite material with anisotropic heat conduction and high temperature resistance. Material.

Especially for the sampling of the inner layer material, through the observation of the transmission electron microscope, it can be clearly observed that there are residual hydrogen elements in the defect structure inside several samples.

As far as Lu Zhou knows, there are only two situations with high probability, which may cause such a result.

In one case, these hydrogen elements decay from neutrons that penetrate the material.

In another case, the high-energy proton beam directly penetrates the inner wall and remains inside the material.

From the perspective that the hydrogen elements and swelling structures inside the material are basically distributed in the shallow area, and comparing the penetration of neutrons and protons, Lu Zhou can basically infer that these swelling structures are most likely caused by the latter situation. caused by.

In this way, there is at least a 90% probability that the remains of the Hall thruster lying in his underground laboratory used fusion nuclear energy.

The nuclear fuel used is most likely to be tritium and helium tritium that release protons in the fusion reaction!

"Sure enough, it's a fusion battery!"

After confirming this guess, Lu Zhou stared at the pictures on the screen carefully, his eyes filled with excitement.

Not only that, he can even roughly infer the technical route adopted by this thing based on limited clues.

For example, judging from the closed structure and the damage to the inner wall of the reactor, this small fusion reactor is probably a one-off.

That is, the fuel is directly integrated in the core, and the entire core is discarded directly after use.

This may sound wasteful, but in fact it is the most feasible approach.

If the bombardment of high-energy proton beams and a small amount of neutrons caused by tritium-tritium reactions cause radiation damage to materials, as well as the economic benefits of long-term operation, many complex designs such as liquid lithium neutron recovery systems can be used Just omit it.

In this way, not only can the engineering difficulty be reduced, but also a lot of valuable space can be saved.

After all, one square meter on the spacecraft is incomparable even at Wudaokou, the center of the universe.

As for shielding materials, heating components, heat exchange systems, and observation systems for monitoring the operation of the core, these relatively expensive designs can be integrated on the engine itself, and together with the generator set, serve as the "battery tank" part of the core. .

If you think about it this way, the engineering difficulty of this one-time fusion power supply structure should not be too high...

Of course, what is said here is not outrageous, only relative to the mature second-generation controllable fusion technology.

If the second-generation controllable fusion reactor is designed with this "throw it away" disposable design concept, the engineering difficulty will probably not be very high, even worse than the STAR-2 demonstration reactor using DT fusion. To be simple, it's just that the cost of power generation will be unacceptably high.

It's like using aerospace fuel to generate electricity for civilian facilities...

"The design concept is to integrate the fuel inside the core, and control the space size and fuel consumption rate of the intermediate reaction chamber through the design of the double-layer structure, so as to achieve the effect of controlling the engine power... In this way, the core should not last Ignition, but pulse ignition."

"However, the fusion battery on the remains of the Hall thruster probably does not use magnetic confinement, it should be another technical route."

Although he found a structure similar to a superconducting magnet on the remains of the Hall thruster, that scale is obviously not enough to confine the hundreds of millions of degrees of high-temperature plasma. And in terms of space, the superconducting magnet is directly in contact with the ionization chamber, and its real function is probably to provide an alternating magnetic field for the Hall propulsion unit...

So, should it be an inertial constraint?

Thinking of this, Lu Zhou's eyes gradually brightened as he wrote and drew on the draft paper with a pen.

Pulse ignition, inertial confinement...

The technical route is already clear!

Restraining the excitement in his heart, he crumpled up the manuscript paper on the table, stuffed it into his pocket, then took out his phone, opened the address book and dialed a number.

The bell rang for three seconds, and it was quickly connected. Secretary Feng's voice came from the opposite side.

"Hey?"

Lu Zhou: "It's me."

Feng Shuqing smiled and said: "Professor Lu, what's the matter?"

Lu Zhou: "How is the reorganization of the STAR-2 demonstration reactor project team going?"

Hearing this question, Toyoki Kiyoshi immediately showed a dazed expression on his face, and said.

"Employee resettlement, asset inventory, and property rights definition have basically been completed, and the relevant documents have been handed over to the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission. Now we are waiting for the working group from Shangjing to come and inspect the situation. If there are no major problems, one week at the latest East Asia Power can be separated from the STAR-2 project team."

Speaking of this, Feng Shuqing smiled and said: "I wonder if Professor Lu is ready to get on the bus? If not, I can be two days late."

boarding?

Lu Zhou was slightly stunned, but he didn't realize the deep meaning of this sentence for a while.

But now is obviously not the time to talk about this, so he didn't think too deeply about it. After asking about the reorganization of the STAR-2 project team, he continued.

"Just keep an eye on the affairs of the East Asia Electric Power Company, and follow the instructions of the high-level to carry out the work. I called today mainly to talk about another matter. I have a new research project here, and I need to start the work from the original STAR." Some of the technicians in the -2 project team will be transferred here."

Feng Shuqing didn't ask too much: "Okay, please tell me your name."

Lu Zhou thought for a while and continued: "There may be too many names, and it may not be clear on the phone. I will make a list of who I need and send it to your work email."

Hearing this sentence, Feng Shuqing was slightly stunned.

"Need to use a lot of people?"

Lu Zhou: "It's not too many, maybe ten."

That's not much?

With a wry smile in his heart, Feng Shuqing asked cautiously.

"May I ask what the project is?"

Lu Zhou thought for a while and said.

"On the Miniaturization of Controlled Fusion."

Feng Shuqing: "...???"