SPESIF Conference

NUKE ROCKY44 · Senior Member

SPESIF Conference

John · Senior Member

That metallic hydrogen fuel concept seem a little bit on the "are they serious" side of things. confuse

We can't even produce lab quantities yet and if we could make it would it be stable? Using gravity waves to induce fusion?

Thanks for letting us know about it.

-- Edited by John on Wednesday 24th of February 2010 05:00:42 AM

GoogleNaut · Guru

I seem to remember reading a paper where it was proposed that superconducting materials were natural microwave frequency (GHz) gravitational wave transducers: by enclosing a superconductor within a Faraday Cage (EM shielded) it is possible to stimulate gravitational wave emmision of a dipole antenna driven by impinging microwave freqency electromagnetic radiation...

A few years ago, I had an epiffany about creating a spherically symmetric oscillating gravitational field that, if it could be made intense enough, might support local gravitational collapse. It would require a phased wave approach, which shouldn't be too hard, as it would likely use electromagnetic compontents similar to phased array radars...it was just a question of orders of magnitude of field strength, and the required mathematics to solve the general relativisitic field equations--which unfornutaley I cannot do...

Still, it is a really cool idea. So, I can see high frequency gravity waves as being able to cause nuclear fusion on a small scale...I think it is a splendid idea to take a shot at.

Micro gravititational collapse for power generation I suspect might be one of the 'holy grails' that could be a real game changer...

NUKE ROCKY44 · Senior Member

Agreed, collapsing gravity on a micro level is refreshing for power advocates like us.

...any advice on intro. literature on this tech. - links ??

Gravwave LLC the company specializing on this tech.

http://www.gravwave.com/

yales · Member

Practical use of HFGW is simply bogus pseudo-science.

The energies and time-scales involved exceed the age of the universe and the power output of the planet.

You may be aware of the organization known as JASON. It is an independent group of absolute top quality scientists which provide unbiased analysis of technical and scientific issues under contract to the US government.

JASON members include Freeman Dyson (theoretician for Project Orion), Richard Garwin (designer of Ivy Mike, the first US hydrogen bomb), Leon Lederman (Nobel laureate and Director Emeritus of Fermi National Laboratory), and dozens more.

At the request of the Defense Department, JASON was tasked with analyzing the the practical possibilities of HFGW. They concluded that:

Our main conclusions are that the proposed applications of the science of HFGW are fundamentally wrong; ... We conclude that previous analysis of the Li-Baker detector concept is incorrect by many orders of magnitude; and that the following are infeasible in the foreseeable future: detection of the natural relic HFGW, which are reliably predicted to exist; or detection of artificial sources of HFGW. No foreign threat in HFGW is credible, including: Communication by means of HFGW; Object detection or imaging (by HFGW radar or tomography); Vehicle propulsion by HFGW; or any other practical use of HFGW

The full scathing report is here:
http://www.fas.org/irp/agency/dod/jason/gravwaves.pdf

NUKE ROCKY44 · Senior Member

I couldn't say one way or the other.

Who is correct and who isn't?

JASON vs Gravwave.

Lots of reasons influence science experimentation these days techo hubris, monetary reward, political influence, patent rights and military strategic technical advantage.
I think as scientific experimentation progresses some concepts are adopted some are dropped only time will tell. This isn't the first time scientific controversy has surfaced nor will it be the last.

Gavwave says:

Q: Did the JASON analysts utilize the usual approach to scientific inquiry?

A: No. The JASON analysts did not avail themselves of the opportunity, which most scientific investigators do, to consult with presenters during their study. For example, The GravWave presenters could have recommended relevant peer-reviewed HFGW literature and suggested they not waste time studying the Gertsenshtein Effect in detail.
As far as we know, the Gertsenshtein Effect has little relevance to useful HFGW detection and norelevance to laboratory HFGW generation.

Q: Do you believe that the organizers of the GravWave briefing to the JASONs had a preconceived agenda to discredit high-frequency gravitational wave research in general and the GravWave LLC research in particular?

A: It is difficult to believe otherwise.
Ordinarily, an unbiased analysis of a technical presentation would have involved some consultation with the presenters in order to better define the subject matter. Furthermore, an exclusive focus on only one HFGW detector, to the exclusion of the Birmingham University, INFN Genoa and Japanese HFGW detectors, which the GravWave presenters discussed in their PowerPoint presentation, would be unwarranted in an unbiased analysis, as would be the avoidance of a discussion of other HFGW-generator research presented by GravWave. Only one HFGW detector paper was scrutinized by the JASON authors -- their reference [10]. Although never discussed in the GravWave presentation, the Abstract of that paper did mention the Gertsenshtein Effect, but the first paragraph of the actual paper admonished the reader to review the other literature that clearly showed that the detector was the result of a combination of the Gertsenshtein Effect with synchro-resonance, the Li-effect and not the Gertsenshtein Effect alone.
Their avoidance of analysis of the basic reference [11] in their Report, which
covered the Li-effect, was certainly unwarranted in an unbiased Report.

http://www.gravwave.com/docs/Q%20&%20A.pdf

-- Edited by NUKE ROCKY44 on Saturday 27th of February 2010 03:02:35 AM

-- Edited by NUKE ROCKY44 on Saturday 27th of February 2010 03:04:54 AM

yales · Member

The point that the JASON's (who DON'T have an agenda) were making (and I agree), and which they demonstrate by straightforward sets of standard equations, is that the energies and time scales required to generate sufficient gravitons to do anything whatsoever useful is infinitely beyond any human-made device.

Gigahertz gravity waves are just potentially possible to DETECT (altho no one -EVER- has), but GENERATING the gazillions of gravitons (and NO ONE has EVER demonstrated they have produced even ONE) is beyond comprehension. Don't forget, under General Relativity, gravity is the curvature of space-time by mass.

Read GravWaves literature- have they claimed that they (or anyone) actually either detected or generated a gravity wave? I don't see it.

Their comments on the JASONs were off-base.

Here is just 2 examples:

1) From the GraveWave link you posted:
"An additional serious error is the assertion that gravitational waves cannot be utilized as a means for propulsion. A very well known example of the rocket propulsion effect, which can be produced by gravitational waves, is that of a star undergoing asymmetric octupole collapse, which achieves a net velocity
change of 100 to 300 km/s via the anisotropic emission of gravitational waves
(Berkenstein, 1973)."

Notice what they say - that a star - millions of times more massive than the Earth - if it undergoes asymmetric octupole collapse can be rocketed. Sure, so what? Stellar collapse into a neutron star is not very practical for doing anything useful in the lab. That is precisely what the JASONs were saying. Yes, gravity waves on the scale on collapsing neutron stars have incredible effects, but are absolutely irrelevant to human-scale technology. GravWave left out the word "PRACTICAL" that the JASON stated. " Vehicle propulsion by HFGW; or any other practical use of HFGW"

2) GravWave complains that their particular detector was not analysed. Not true.
Sections 4.1, 4.2, and 4.3 dealt SPECIFICALLY with their design and trashed it in painstaking analytical detail.

-- Edited by yales on Saturday 27th of February 2010 06:58:36 AM

John · Senior Member

One thing to consider is that the gravitational constant is very small. So it takes a lot of energy to cause a noticable gravitational wave. That is really the basis of the Jason report. There were also a whole set of papers that seem to be on the theory of this same subject by Raymond Y. Chiao of Cal Berkeley starting in 2002. He in fact performed an experiment to attempt to detect gravity waves with Walt Fitelson. However, they reported a negative result.

My own opinion for what is worth is that something like this can't work based on classical gravitational coupling. There would have to be quantum coupling of some sort. Since gravitons are spin-2 particles the an interaction like that which happens when very high energy photons interact with hadrons via vector meson dominance seems unlikely. The Chiao paper spends a lot of pages of theory exploring analogies to Maxwell's equations in parts of the off diagonal components of the metric tensor. His approach is semi-classical which suggest he was trying to approximate some quantum gravity effects that might have spin 1 (vector) character.

I also have read about but don't claim to understand that there are versions of quantum gravity approaches that yield not just spin-2 gravitons but also spin-1 and spin-0 prarticles as well. Chiao may have been assuming this in his work. I don't know. The point is that there might be (very speculative) a possibility for some quantum coupling between E&M and gravity that might also some thing like the Gravwave claims. However, and this is most important, this is outside of established physics.

My thought is to pay attention to what they are doing but don't get your hopes up.

NUKE ROCKY44 · Senior Member

Gravitons/Gravitational wave all predict correctly Gravity.

Relax... this stuff called Gravity can be manipulated just let it mature. wink