12-02-2003 03:00									#31
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ermm, so what exactly happens in a Hydrogen bomb, not a H+H reaction?

	12-02-2003 03:01									#32
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H bombs don't ignite the atmosphere, depsite it being replete with hydrogen. (although it was a major fear in the 50s)

	12-02-2003 03:06									#33
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Why?

I think it's because:
1) The atmosphere is much less dense.
2)It's composed of Nitrogen and oxygen, that are waay harder to fuse.

But if we put a probe that would sink, a couple of hundreds of feet deep into Jupiter, there will be tons of Helium, and Hydrogen.


I know that my question sounds far-fetched, esp. with the Shumacher-Levy comet that was said to generate much more energy than any nuke.

	12-02-2003 03:09									#34
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Azazael, the heat would be dispersed faster than it was created.

If not, as BC has said, Jupiter would have gone critical already. There is fusion going on all the time wherever there's hydrogen...but without sufficient density of hydrogen it dies out.

	12-02-2003 03:12									#35
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Jupiter is more dense, but I doubt dense enough to sustain a nuclear reaction.

When they discuss minimum solar masses I don't think that its ignition that is the issue, more the sustainability of a reaction due to high temperature and density. Jupiter would lose heat through radiative transfer too quickly to retain the necessary temperature, and its density would fall due to the higher temperature causing expansion.

	12-02-2003 03:14									#36
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Exactly. With sufficient density, a trigger will always be found. Either a cosmic ray or just statistical variations in the energy of each individual particle will end up generating a single reaction...and if you're at critical density, that'll ignite another, etc.

	12-02-2003 03:14									#37
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quote: Originally posted by Azazel ermm, so what exactly happens in a Hydrogen bomb, not a H+H reaction?

D-T, I would imagine.

	12-02-2003 03:22									#38
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but I am not talking about an incidental existance of an activation energy. that would release this couple of MeV. I am talking about a nuke that would trigger fusion on a scale, just like in an H-bomb.

If you could please explain me why it isn't feasible?

The energy of a nuke, just dissipates?

	12-02-2003 03:25									#39
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So what makes a quantum computer more desirable than a binary computer?

	12-02-2003 03:28									#40
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Nothing. It's basically an analogue computer. People point to the mass amounts of information storage, but neglect to tell you that it's fault-prone just like every other analogue storage method.

	12-02-2003 03:28									#41
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hmm, crosspost with Frogger:

so there is no way to make Jupiter ignite?

	12-02-2003 03:32									#42
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quote: Originally posted by Azazel but I am not talking about an incidental existance of an activation energy. that would release this couple of MeV. I am talking about a nuke that would trigger fusion on a scale, just like in an H-bomb. If you could please explain me why it isn't feasible? The energy of a nuke, just dissipates?

Azazel, it doesn't matter how much energy you pour in. You'll never get a self-sustaining reaction. If you put enough energy in (billions of H-bombs?) then the atmosphere would fuse completely...but it wouldn't have been a self sustaining reaction.

It's just like fission reactions. If I only have a gram of uranium I can't make it undergo a self-sustaining chain reaction. I can bombard it with neutrons until it's all transmuted, but at any point if I stop bombarding it the reaction will just die down.

	12-02-2003 03:34									#43
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quote: Originally posted by Azazel hmm, crosspost with Frogger: so there is no way to make Jupiter ignite?

Maybe if you had 10 or 20 jupiters and banged them into each other...or if you had some sort of nuclear catalyst that would drop the activation energy of the H-H reaction (I'm not aware of any such energy path).

	12-02-2003 03:38									#44
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ok...a last one: how did the sun ignite, then?

	12-02-2003 03:41									#45
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It had enough mass to provide a sufficiently dense environment. The original "spark" would be impossible to determine. It could have been anything that momentarily raised a very, very small region of the sun to a high enough temperature. Random fluctuations in molecule speeds would have done it pretty quickly, but something else may have done it first. It probably "lit" millions of times and was then "extinguished" because it didn't yet have enough mass (it hadn't sucked up enough of the primordial hydrogen from surrounding regions yet).

	12-02-2003 03:45									#46
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sorry for torturing you. Now I feel I have the complete picture.

	12-02-2003 04:30									#47
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quote: What is an ion engine?

basically it is an engine that uses an electric field to charge particles. By ejecting these charged particles, thrust is created. (thrust can be created, however, by ejecting any type of particle, by Newton's 3rd law. im not sure what advantage charging them has )

	12-02-2003 04:32									#48
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If you don't charge them you can't accelerate them using electric fields.

	12-02-2003 05:13									#49
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quote: Originally posted by NeOmega Can anybody give a brief description of the theroies behind: *Why Plasma is considered a fourth element

State, not element. IIRC Plasma is elements that are stripped of thier electrons. (Not that I'm a physics professor or anything...)

quote: *speculation on what dark matter is

Dark matter? Dunno what it is, but IIRC it's the undetectable stuff that gives the extra gravity required to hold the universe together.

quote: *neutrinos, and if they are in any way controllable, capturable, detectable.

They're detected. IIRC pools of water are built deep underground (where a lot of other particles are weeded out) and somehow water acts as a reflector or detector or some other stuff.

quote: *Fission vs Fusion..... and cold fusion

Sure you already know this, but fission is when atoms break apart. Fusion is when atoms join together. Our sun is powered by fusion, hydrogen bombs use fusion, and fusion produces helluva lot more energy than fission.

quote: What is a quantum computer?

IIRC a quantum computer is a computer capable of creating an infinite number of parallel universes to each work on a seperate part of the problem. (To use a classical computing example, breaking an encryption with 1 processor at 2GHz is going to take ~4billion years, but with 2 only ~2bill, 4 only ~1bill, etc. The more power you have, the faster it is, and when you have infinite power, it's truly immediate.

Hope this helps

	12-02-2003 05:33									#50
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quote: Originally posted by Frogger If you don't charge them you can't accelerate them using electric fields.

ah yes i forgot!

thank ya

	12-02-2003 05:34									#51
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quote: There are five states of matter, by the way. Urban Ranger forgot about absolute zero matter - when it's so cold that the atoms have stopped vibrating altogether.

Has this ever been achieved, and what are some potential uses for such a state? Can it cause a chain reaction, (create more around it) and is it impossible, (by defintiton of heat), to go lower than 0 K?

quote: Then there is the Bose-Einstein condensate, which is even more exotic.

Eenput! Eenput! explain please!

	12-02-2003 05:35									#52
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I want either a holodeck or a Matrix-style computer hookup so I can have sex with women all day.

	12-02-2003 06:02									#53
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quote: and is it impossible, (by defintiton of heat), to go lower than 0 K?

I think it is impossible. It seems to also be impossible to reach 0 K because the matter would fall apart.

	12-02-2003 06:06									#54
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The 0 Kelvin state is useful as you can store energy indefinately with no loss.

	12-02-2003 06:11									#55
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quote: Originally posted by NeOmega Eenput! Eenput! explain please!

Bosons are integer-spin particles. The fundamental property of bosons is that the Pauli Exclusion Principle does not apply to them (as it does to fermions)

As such it is possible for an infinite number of bosons to occupy the same quantum state. At low energies, bosons will all "choose" to occupy the same, lowest-energy state. The phenomenon of a single, superdense collection of bosons in this lowest energy state is called a "Bose-Einstein condensate", since Bose (after whom the boson is named) and Einstein contributed to the mathematical treatment of statistical ensembles of bosons (the "Bose-Einstein statistics").

	12-02-2003 09:26									#56
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quote: Originally posted by NeOmega So what makes a quantum computer more desirable than a binary computer?

Supposedly, you can do interesting things with it, like factoring large numbers quickly.

	12-02-2003 09:29									#57
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quote: Originally posted by Skanky Burns The 0 Kelvin state is useful as you can store energy indefinately with no loss.

You don't need 0K, just superconductivity.

	12-02-2003 09:30									#58
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quote: Originally posted by Frogger Maybe if you had 10 or 20 jupiters and banged them into each other...or if you had some sort of nuclear catalyst that would drop the activation energy of the H-H reaction (I'm not aware of any such energy path).

IIRC, Jupiter is just a bit below the mass of a brown dwarf.

	12-02-2003 09:31									#59
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quote: You don't need 0K, just superconductivity.

I thought one meant the existance of the other?

	12-02-2003 09:33									#60
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Sure, if you achieve 0K, you get superconductivity. However, to get superconductivity, you don't need to get to 0K, just sufficiently low temperatures will do.