Production of muons for fusion catalysis in a magnetic mirror configuration. Revision 1

Conference · Fri Jul 25 04:00:00 EDT 1986

OSTI ID:5309233

Moir, R W; Chapline, Jr, G F

For muon-catalyzed fusion to be of practical interest, a very efficient means of producing muons must be found. We describe a scheme for producing muons that may be more energy efficient than any heretofore proposed. There are, in particular, some potential advantages of creating muons from collisions of high energy tritons confined in a magnetic mirror configuration. If one could catalyze 200 fusions per muon and employ a uranium blanket that would multiply the neutron energy by a factor of 10, one might produce electricity with an overall plant efficiency (ratio of electric energy produced to nuclear energy released) approaching 30%. One possible near term application of a muon-producing magnetic-mirror scheme would be to build a high-flux neutron source for radiation damage studies. The careful arrangement of triton orbits will result in many of the ..pi../sup -/'s being produced near the axis of the magnetic mirror. The pions quickly decay into muons, which are transported into a small (few-cm-diameter) reactor chamber producing approximately 1-MW/m/sup 2/ neutron flux on the chamber walls, using a laboratory accelerator and magnetic mirror. The costs of construction and operation of the triton injection accelerator probably introduces most of the uncertainty in the viability of this scheme. If a 10-..mu..A, 600 MeV neutral triton accelerator could be built for less than $100 million and operated cheaply enough, one might well bring muon-catalyzed fusion into practical use.

• Research Organization: Lawrence Livermore National Lab., CA (USA)
• DOE Contract Number: W-7405-ENG-48
• OSTI ID: 5309233
• Report Number(s): UCRL-93987-Rev.1; CONF-860601-6-Rev.1; ON: DE86013896
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY
700205* -- Fusion Power Plant Technology-- Fuel
Heating
& Injection Systems
ACTINIDES
CHARGED PARTICLES
CROSS SECTIONS
ELEMENTARY PARTICLES
ELEMENTS
FERMIONS
HYBRID SYSTEMS
LEPTONS
MAGNETIC FIELD CONFIGURATIONS
MAGNETIC MIRROR CONFIGURATIONS
METALS
MUON-CATALYZED FUSION
MUONS
MUONS MINUS
NUCLEAR REACTIONS
NUCLEOSYNTHESIS
OPEN CONFIGURATIONS
SYNTHESIS
THERMONUCLEAR REACTIONS
TRITONS
URANIUM