Fusion, muon catalyzed

In this article, we shall focus on the reactions of muonic hydrogen atoms and molecules, and their energy dependent properties revealed by a newly developed time-of-flight spectroscopy technique [2,3,4,5], with particular emphasis on reactions related to muon catalyzed fusion phenomena. 

A negative muon can participate in a variety of atomic and molecular processes. A muonic atom is formed when a muon stops in matter replacing an electron. A muonic atom interacting with ordinary atoms or molecules can form a muonic molecule. The latter in turn can result in fusion reactions between the nuclei if the target consists of hydrogen isotopes, a phenomenon known as muon catalyzed fusion (pCF) [6]. 

Collision-Induced Coherences in Optical Physics, G. S. Agarwal Muon-Catalyzed Fusion, Johann Rafelski and Helga E. Rafelski... 

Deuteron and tritium bound together represent a helium nueleus. One muon may participate in about 200-300 such muon-catalyzed fusion processes. Everybody knows how much effort and money has been spent for decades (for the moment in vain) to ignite the nuclear synthesis d -H t - He. Muon-catalyzed fusion might be an alternative solution. If the muon project were successful, humanity would have access to a practically unlimited source of energy. Unfortunately, theoretical investigations suggest that the experimental yield already achieved is about the maximum theoretical value. ... 

This has been the subject of a joint Pohsh-American project. More about this may be found in K. Szalewicz, S. Alexander, P. Froehch, S. Haywood, B. Jeziorski, W. Kotos, HJ. Monkhorst, A. Scrinzi, C. Stodden, A. Velaiik, and X. Zhao, in Muon Catalyzed Fusion, eds. S Ji. Jones. J. Rafelski. H.J. Monkhorst, AIP Conference Proceedings, 181.254(1989). 

HTS (p. 322) infrared spectrum (p. 280) microwave spectrum (p. 280) molecular structure (p. 276) moment of inertia (p. 295) muon-catalyzed fusion (p. 327)... 

As mentioned before, the neutral exotic hydrogen atom (having neither Coulomb nor Pauli repulsion) can penetrate other atoms and lose its exotic particle to a heavier nucleus. As the rate of this reaction is proportional to the number of collisions, it can be detected for hadronic atoms but it is really dramatic for muonic hydrogen as its lifetime is many orders of magnitude longer in the muon-catalyzed fusion measurements, for example, the concentration of heavy impurities has to be below 10 to avoid the distortion of the results by transfer. This feature was used to study muon capture in rare gas isotopes as it is sufficient to have less than 1% krypton in hydrogen to have all muons ended up in muonic krypton states. 

Scheme of muon-catalyzed fusion in a deuterium-tritium mixture. As a result of the fusion 17.6 MeV is released per " He atom (Os is the sticking probability)... 

Markushin VE (1999) Hyperfine Interact 119 11 Measday DF (1990) In Simons et al (1989) p 53 Measday DF (2001) Phys Rep 354 243 MuCF07 (2007) Proceedings of the International Conference on Muon Catalyzed Fusion and Related Topics, JINR, Dubna, Russia... 

Some molecules look really peculiar, they may contain a muon instead of an electron. The muon is an unstable particle with the charge of an electron and mass equal to 207 electron masses. For such a mass, assuming that nuclei are infinitely heavier than a muon looks like a very bad approximation. Therefore, the calculations need to be non-adiabatic. The first computations for muonic molecules were performed by Kolos, Roothaan and Sack in 1960. The idea behind the project was muon catalyzed fusion of deuterium and tritium. This fascinatmg problem was proposed by the Russian physicist Andrei... 

The term cold fusion was originally adopted to describe muon-catalyzed fusion. 

Muon catalyzed fusion reactions are currently being investigated by many investigators for obvious reasons. The cross section for muon transfer between triton and deuteron atoms is one of the many reactions of interest. 

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