Bubble, bubble, boil and trouble.....
March 15, 2005 12:24 PM Subscribe
Recent bubbles offer first confirmed desktop plasma generation through sonoluminesence. You remember sonoluminesence right? Responsible for brilliant shrimp, and skinny people...
The bubbles are very hot, but also very, very small.
posted by blue mustard at 12:46 PM on March 15, 2005
posted by blue mustard at 12:46 PM on March 15, 2005
First link seems to be broken.........
posted by krash2fast at 1:46 PM on March 15, 2005
posted by krash2fast at 1:46 PM on March 15, 2005
My summary and thoughts on a previous post on the Oak Ridge results.
posted by fatllama at 2:27 PM on March 15, 2005
posted by fatllama at 2:27 PM on March 15, 2005
daq, the liquid is actually chilled to very near freezing. The bubbles are far from thermal equilibrium, so the high temperatures only exist in tiny places for billionths of a second. You have the cause/effect relationship here backwards: the heat is generated by compressing the bubbles with sound waves. The flashes of light account for a small portion of the energy involved, but are nearly coincident with the acoustic collapse.
In principle, one extracts energy from this system not by directly tapping the heat from the bubbles but fromhot neutrons and fusion by-products that might result at those high temperatures.
posted by fatllama at 2:34 PM on March 15, 2005
In principle, one extracts energy from this system not by directly tapping the heat from the bubbles but fromhot neutrons and fusion by-products that might result at those high temperatures.
posted by fatllama at 2:34 PM on March 15, 2005
The first link still works for me, but, for those interested, another good description of the results
is available at sciencenews.
Oh, and apologies for the misspellings in the original post, it's sonoluminescence, not sonoluminesence.
I recognize this is a bit sciencenewsfilterish, but how cool is plasma generated from sonic resonance?
While not as wow-factor as the somewhat controversial Taleyarkhan papers claiming observation of fusion (cf. the post fatllama links to) the clear signal of ionization is significant in its own right. It's nice that it also offers some cheer to the sonolumi fusion hopefuls.
posted by johnjoe at 3:11 PM on March 15, 2005
is available at sciencenews.
Oh, and apologies for the misspellings in the original post, it's sonoluminescence, not sonoluminesence.
I recognize this is a bit sciencenewsfilterish, but how cool is plasma generated from sonic resonance?
While not as wow-factor as the somewhat controversial Taleyarkhan papers claiming observation of fusion (cf. the post fatllama links to) the clear signal of ionization is significant in its own right. It's nice that it also offers some cheer to the sonolumi fusion hopefuls.
posted by johnjoe at 3:11 PM on March 15, 2005
Yes, I agree that this is very cool.
posted by buriednexttoyou at 3:34 PM on March 15, 2005
posted by buriednexttoyou at 3:34 PM on March 15, 2005
I don't mean to burst your bubble, but...
;)
This is incredibly cool (hot)!! I've always been fascinated by supercavitation (think superfast - 200+mph torpedoes), but never considered cavitation by other than purely mechanical means.
Super duper neato!
posted by zerokey at 5:14 PM on March 15, 2005
;)
This is incredibly cool (hot)!! I've always been fascinated by supercavitation (think superfast - 200+mph torpedoes), but never considered cavitation by other than purely mechanical means.
Super duper neato!
posted by zerokey at 5:14 PM on March 15, 2005
Yeah, bubble fusion. To me this seems like the path we should be going down towards getting fusion working as a power source. Not these googol-billion dollar tokamaks with frikkin' laser beams. I want my Mr. Fusion.
posted by todbot at 1:19 AM on March 18, 2005
posted by todbot at 1:19 AM on March 18, 2005
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posted by daq at 12:43 PM on March 15, 2005