Institute for Advanced Study dean's office.
When Lu Zhou saw Yang Xu walk in, he put down the pen in his hand and looked at him.
"Is the analysis results out?"
Yang Xu took out a USB from his pocket and placed it on Lu Zhou's desk. He said, "The information is inside."
Lu Zhou asked, "What about the original?"
Yang Xu: "It's been backed up to the database … Is there a problem?"
Lu Zhou: "Destroy it."
Yang Xu paused for a second, but he didn't ask why. He just nodded.
"Okay."
After the office door was closed, Lu Zhou connected the USB to his laptop and opened the folder. He began to carefully look at the pictures.
Yesterday morning, when he came out of the underground laboratory, he took a few pieces of the circular double-layer structure between the fuel tank and the heat exchanger to Yang Xu's place to do an infrared spectrum characteristic peak analysis. He also took a transmission electron microscope picture of it.
Judging from the situation in the pictures, his guess was indeed confirmed.
Even though the broken nano-ceramic composite material was embrittled and it was difficult to infer its original structural characteristics, from the carbon residue inside it, it could be concluded that it was some kind of anisotropic heat conduction composite material and was resistant to high temperatures.
Especially for the samples of the inner layer material, through transmission electron microscopy, it could be clearly seen that there were hydrogen residues in the defective structures inside the samples.
As far as Lu Zhou knew, there were only two possibilities that could cause this result.
One was that the hydrogen was formed by the decay of neutrons that penetrated the material.
The other was that a high-energy proton beam directly penetrated the inner wall and remained inside the material.
Judging from the fact that the hydrogen inside the material and the swelling structure were basically distributed in the shallow area, Lu Zhou could basically infer that the swelling structure was mainly caused by the proton and neutron penetrating power.
In this case, there was a 90% chance that the debris of the Hall-effect thruster lying in his underground laboratory used fusion nuclear energy.
And the nuclear fuel used was most likely tritium and helium-3, which released protons in the fusion reaction!
"It really is a fusion battery!"
After confirming this guess, Lu Zhou stared at the picture on the screen with excitement in his eyes.
Not only that, but he could even roughly infer the technological route used by this thing based on the limited clues.
For example, judging from the sealed structure and the damage to the inner wall of the reactor, this small fusion reactor was probably a one-time use.
That was, the fuel would be directly integrated into the nuclear core, and the entire nuclear core would be discarded after use.
This might sound wasteful, but in fact, it was the most feasible method.
If the bombardment of high-energy proton beams and a small amount of neutrons produced by the tritium reaction weren't considered, as well as the long-term economic benefits of the operation, many complex designs such as liquid lithium neutron recovery systems could be omitted.
In this way, not only could they reduce the difficulty of the project, but they could also save a lot of valuable space.
After all, a square meter on a spacecraft couldn't even be compared to the center of the universe.
As for the shielding materials, heating components, heat exchange systems, and observation systems used to monitor the operation of the nuclear core, these more expensive designs could be integrated into the engine itself and used as a "battery slot" for the nuclear core along with the generator set.
Thinking about it this way, the engineering difficulty of this one-time fusion power supply structure shouldn't be too high …
Of course, this wasn't too high; it was only relative to the mature second-generation controllable fusion technology.
If the second-generation controllable fusion reactor was designed using this disposable design concept, the engineering difficulty probably wouldn't be too high. It might even be a bit simpler than the STAR-2 demonstration reactor using DT fusion. However, the cost of power generation would be unacceptably high.
It was like using aerospace fuel to generate electricity for civilian facilities …
"The design concept is to integrate the fuel inside the nuclear core and control the space size of the middle reaction chamber and the fuel consumption rate through a double-layer structure design to achieve the effect of controlling the engine power … So, this nuclear core shouldn't be a continuous ignition, but a pulsed ignition.
"But the fusion battery on the wreckage of the Hall-effect thruster probably doesn't use magnetic confinement, it should be another technical route."
Even though he found a structure similar to a superconducting magnet on the wreckage of the Hall-effect thruster, it obviously wasn't large enough to confine hundreds of millions of degrees of plasma. Also, the superconducting magnet was directly in contact with the ionization chamber. Its real function was most likely to be to provide an alternating magnetic field for the Hall-effect thruster unit …
So, it should be inertial confinement?
Lu Zhou was writing on the draft paper, and his eyes gradually lit up.
Pulsed ignition, inertial confinement …
The technical route was clear!
He suppressed the excitement in his heart and crumpled the draft paper on the table. He stuffed it into his pocket and took out his phone. He opened his address book and dialed a number.
The phone rang for three seconds before it was connected. Secretary Feng's voice came from the other side.
"Hello?"
Lu Zhou: "It's me."
Feng Shuqing smiled and said, "Professor Lu, what's up?"
Lu Zhou: "How is the restructuring of the STAR-2 demonstration reactor project team going?"
When Feng Shuqing heard this question, he suddenly had a look of realization on his face as he spoke.
"The staff placement, asset inventory, and property rights have basically been completed. The relevant documents have been handed over to the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission. Now, we're just waiting for the Beijing team to come over and inspect the situation. If there are no major problems, East Asia Power will be separated from the STAR-2 project team in a week. "
Feng Shuqing smiled and said, "I don't know if Professor Lu is ready to get on the bus? If you're not ready, I can also wait two days. "
Get on the bus?
Lu Zhou paused for a second. He didn't understand what Lu Zhou meant.
However, now was obviously not the time to talk about this, so he didn't think too much about it. After asking about the restructuring of the STAR-2 project team, he continued.
After asking about the restructuring of the STAR-2 project team, he continued, "Just keep an eye on the East Asia Power Company and follow the instructions of the higher-ups. I'm calling today to talk about something else. I have a new research project here, and I need some technicians from the original STAR-2 project team. "
Feng Shuqing didn't ask any questions. "Okay, give me the names."
Lu Zhou thought for a bit and said, "There might be a lot of names, so I can't explain it clearly over the phone. I'll make a list and send it to your email."
Hearing this, Feng Shuqing was slightly taken aback.
"You need a lot of people?"
Lu Zhou: "Not a lot, around ten."
That's not a lot?
Feng Shuqing smiled bitterly in his heart and asked cautiously.
"Can I ask what project it is?"
Lu Zhou thought for a bit and spoke.
"It's about the miniaturization of controllable fusion."
Feng Shuqing: "…???"
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