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Michigan Teen Creates Fusion Device
Josh Lindenmuth writes "The Detroit Free Press is reporting that Thiago Olson, a 17 year old Michigan teen, was able to create a small fusion device in his parents' basement. The machine uses a 40,000 volt charge and deuterium gas to create the small reaction, which he says looks like a 'small intense ball of energy.' The teen's fusion device is obviously not a self-sustaining reactor, but it still shows how fusion technology is becoming more accessible. Hopefully this points to a future where large scale fusion reactors are both economical and widely used."
Could somebody please tell me what energy looks like? I really have no idea.
What is there in the water in Michigan? A few years ago a teen in Michigan created a nuclear fission reactor; now this guy one ups him and creates fusion ?
Where did he get the Deuterium from?
Becoming more accessible? Electrostatic fusion was first demonstrated in the 20s.
That looks good on a college application
How does a 17 year old come by deuterium? I mean the bush administration has a fit when Iran tries to buy some, and in this country you don't even have to be 18 to get it?
I'm lost.
Education is a better safeguard of liberty than a standing army.
Edward Everett (1794 - 1865)
His site: http://fusor.net/board/view.php?site=fusor&bn=fuso r_images&key=1150855195
Can anyone independently verify that fusion is actually occurring here? Is he really creating Helium in the chamber?
If he really managed it, the real news will be when he manages to procreate. Those 14KeV fusion neutrons play very interesting games with DNA. That is if he really managed to get any fusion to succeed which I doubt.
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
It is good to see how the youth can innovate in any field.
I always maintained that innovation for the young scientist will be limited almost completely to computer and software because of the ease with which you can buy a machine, connect to the internet and start hacking.
Good that this young man proved me wrong. Perhaps we will start seeing innovations by high schoolers in all the branches of the sciences and engineering: biology, chemistry, aeronautics, space research, engineering, etc.
No computer will be a better innovating machine than the one between our ears.
Hopefully this points to a future where large scale fusion reactors are both economical and widely used.
Either that, or it points to a future where large scale fusion reactors are widely used in parents' basements.
Push Button, Receive Bacon
He's on the cross country and track teams at Stoney Creek High School in Rochester Hills. He's a good-looking, clean-cut 17-year-old with a 3.75 grade point average, and he has his eyes fixed on the next big step: college.
Little does he know, his next big step will actually be gitmo, and from there, the CIA torture camp in Syria.
Good luck, little buddy!
Push Button, Receive Bacon
but his mother wouldn't let him. Quite right too. There's way too much unjustified exaggeration these days. Far more dangerous than a glowing ball of energy.
From TFA his mother wouldn't let him build a hyperbolic chamber.
Definition of hyperbolic
exaggerated: enlarged beyond truth or reasonableness; "had an exaggerated (or inflated) opinion of himself"; "a hyperbolic style"
What did he use to shield the neutrons or did he just suck them up?
Personally, if I put a dilute gas in a vacuum chamber, apply a voltage and see a small ball of fire, I think plasma. Why is this not just a plasma? How do we know it's fusion?
And what is a "hyperbolic chamber"???????
Note: creating a plasma at 17 years old in a garage would still be very cool. Maybe not slashdot-front-page cool, but still cool.
OK, congrats that this seems to have worked. But a teen experimenting at home with 40.000 volt and Deuterium - am I the only one who thinks this is frightening?
Idha khatabahum lijahiluna qalu salaman
I hope this kid from detroit doesn't know the kids I know from detroit...I can just imagine the rolling party in his basement.
"Wow I love you guys so much! Any of you kandi kids wanna see my fusion reactor? It gives the best light shows!"
You can't take the sky from me.
Sounds like a Farnsworth-Hirsch Fusor: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fusor
so really nothing new.
I think you're confusing deuterium with plain old hydrogen. You can extract hydrogen from water with electrolysis, but separating the deuterium (representing a vanishingly small percentage of the liberated hydrogen) from that would still be, to put it mildly, less than trivial.
IIRC, commercial heavy water plants do something that takes advantage of the slight difference in boiling point between D2O and H2O, and do a very delicate fractional distillation, over and over and over. The energy involved to do it is pretty immense, and it would be tough to do except under very carefully controlled conditions. Hydrogen sulfide may also be involved at some point in the process, as well, at least according to this WP article.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Have a look at this:. stm
Quote, from the article on BBC regarding the building of the experimental fusion reaction in France.
The deal, to be finalised in Paris, follows years of talks between South Korea, Russia, China, the EU, the US, India and Japan.
Seems like your government is involved in fusion research
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6165932
he couldn't create a way to beat ohio state
I'm sorry... but while this teenagers work is certainly commendable and nothing to sneeze at (in fact, Large engineering firms such as Siemens seem to take an interest in him). His work does nothing to further research in the field. Non-sustaining fusion reactors have been around for decades, and its been widely known how to build one for at least 20 years. For most people, the cost is the limiting factor. Why would you want to spend $50k-100k on something that uses more energy than it produces?
Now when we finally get a sustainable fusion reaction that produces more energy that it uses, that would be something to write about!
Yahma
ProxyStorm - An apache based anonymous proxy service.
Any kid who ever built a Van De Graff generator has played with far more than 40kV... I mean, that's only a few centimeters worth of spark at STP. If you've ever gotten 3-4" sparks in dry air, you're playing with way higher voltage than that.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
...of any legal trouble with any federal government agency:
Someday, he hopes to work for the federal government -- just like his grandfather, Clarence Olson, who designed tanks for the Department of Defense after World War II.
This is a Farnsworth-Hirsch Fusor: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fusor . They are no big deal! Effectively it is like a vacuum tube, where an electrical charge is used to accelerate D+ ions until they smack into each other. No biggie! The energy levels needed for fusion are very small and can be achieved in a hand-held device. These fusors are used as laboratory neutron sources.
So if fusion is so easy, and if it's such a great power source, why aren't we using it right now to generate power? The Fusor device can easily make fusion happen but, for various reasons, it is not energy-positive fusion. The energy you get out of it cannot be capture in a useful way to get more energy than was put into it. So they're great for neutrons but not much else.
If someone could figure out a design that would be energy-positive then we would have something amazing but there's nothing there for that right now.
dont forget to keep Dee Dee out of lab..
He's never gonna get laid anyway, so why should he worry about it?
Making a fusion reactor is relatively easy, albeit somewhat dangerous, like you said.
From here:
As with any nuclear-related project, safety must be taken into consideration.
[...]
* Radiation; this should be the least of your worries until about 15,000 volts of acceleration potential. At this point, x-rays start to emanate from viewports due to electron and ion bombardment of metals in the chamber. Always use a camera or mirror to peer into the viewport. X-rays can cause burns and lead to cancer. Above 40,000 volts, x-rays will start to come through the stainless steel chamber walls. At this point, you will need to use lead shielding. Neutron radiation is the most dangerous form of radiation known to man, but the fusor does not put out enough of it to be dangerous until about 45,000 volts. It can easily be shielded with water, wax or plastic. You can also minimize your exposure by standing well away from the fusor, or by operating it for only 20 minutes per week.
More safety info.
Really, it's that pesky part where we try to actually make it produce energy and break even that is stumping us right now.
Qualitas edurus commercium, nullus penitus net rimor, nullus deus beneficium
I'm in the process of this very thing... on a much larger scale... in my dining roo+++NO CARRIER
this is the statement of an asshole. Why make an almost asinine comment like this?... a 17 year old applied himself in a very unsual way that shows intelligence, aptitude, application, and determination. Researched, developed and built a remarkable machine. Sure, it's been demonstrated since the 20's, but you probably read about it in a book at best. Or looked up on wikipedia that it was first done in the 20's.
Most people just read about things. Others do things. Knowing things and not doing is borderline redundant. Hearing of something being done for a long time and never even remotely applying yourself even within 1%, and then criticising and reducing the absolutely remarkable efforts of others is borderline criminal. Get a life, but more importantly, get some perspective.
I'd love to see a picture of your fusion machine, or anything even remotely demonstrating the independent application of intelligence. People that make these kinds of comments rarely partake in anything of the kind.
Alternatively, he might have bought a small quantity from a scientific supplier. Even the Government is going to realise, especially if his teachers wrote in, that the size of fusion bomb you can build with a couple of grammes of heavy water and the tritium from a beta light is less of a threat to the US than one NRA member with a hangover and a grudge against his ex-wife.
Pining for the fjords
I love bylines! They're so incriminating.
Like GINA DAMRON, the reporter who doesn't listen, and can not know the difference between a "Hyperbaric Chamber" and a [sic] Hyperbolic Chamber, which sounds oddly shaped, but unremarkable.
Good on you Gina, keep up that keen reporting.
I'm looking forward to your report on the Frictional Distillation process.
How many escape pods are there? "NONE,SIR!" You counted them? "TWICE, SIR!"
Well at least he didn't build a fission reactor in his tool shed, and create a EPA Superfund site.
And people keep telling us that USA kids don't do science. Shit.
A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
I'd be much more likely to believe he'd managed to burn some hydrogen in a ball of gas and that his little vacuum chamber is less than perfect. Sounds like pseudo scientific horse shit (still steaming) to me.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
Dechlorinating the Moderator by Charles Stross. Check out Scratch Monkey & Accelerando while you're there, too.
;)
Amazed that no one's posted this yet in a story about amateur physics
The FBI hasn't fallen on him like a ton of rectangular building blocks yet?
What the kid did is amazing. All CF experiments are, and I'm happy to see any progress in the field. The "old news" part was a bit of a joke? Good god man.
Philo Farnsworth did this ages ago. So what's the big deal? All of a sudden, just because someone does something that has a techy-sounding name, it becomes newsworthy regardless of the fact that it is NOTHING new?
Knowing Google's lust for data collection, the Soviet Union is still alive and well inside the psyche of Sergey Brin....
Forgot... No, it's not an anti-catholic site. It's supposed to be "autopope" but that got messed up in Internet pre-history.
...about a bunch of niggers throwing a ball around?
If I had a nickle every time I created fusion, well, I'd still be broke.
Learn to love Alaska
Sensitive are we? It is old news. Good news. Interesting news. But nothing new. Jesus christ what's wrong with you people are touchy. Mod the post as flamebait no less.
I don't know why, but the recurring theme in my head while reading the article was the similarity to Micho Kaku's experience in HS that he describes in his book Hyperspace: A Scientific Odyssey Through Parallel Universes, Time Warps, and the 10th Dimension...I believe it's page 5-6.
Am I the only one that thinks he's an idiot for trying to construct ANY fusion device under his parent's house? Geez, what if he'd created a fusion reaction that was larger than he could contain?
Who does he think he is, Elroy Jetson?
Nitewing '98
Everything works...in theory.
FOR FUCK SAKES PEOPLE: I know many kids, including myself & my own two kids who did simple chemistry set stuff at less than 5 and tasks more complex than changing batteries in cars long before 9, and explosives etc before ten.
I doubt this is real fusion & will remain sceptical until somebody in a white lab coat and thick glasses confirms it. Sorry mom, your opinion doesn't count.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
Bizarrely enough, not only are they funding it (along with the rest of the developed world), they will sign the consortium agreement today.
"Linux is for noobs"-The new MS fud strategy
A quick look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farnsworth-Hirsch_Fus or reveals that this is a fairly simply, but clever experiment. He is a bright kid, and one day he'll most likely become a physicist. Or perhaps not - whereas the device is simple enough to build, I haven't been able to find a place to buy deuterium, unless you want to talk to a guy called Al (last name of 'Qaeda').
Uh, let's write a story that make it look like he "creates" a standard Fanrnsworth-Hirsch Fusor (built for science fair projects, low level neutron sources, and just shits & grins for 50 years) and make the kid look like a genius.
Technical skill? Yes. Advanced knowledge? Yes.
But primarily, ability to follow directions available everywhere? Yes.
He may very well be a genius, but it is as likely that he's a genius at self-promotion as anything. There are many high-quality science projects he could have done, but add the words "nuclear" and "fusion" and you attract a lot of media attention. He'll make a good string theorist...
JD
It burnsss ussss.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
This was discussed a bit in the prior /. article about IEC.
If he does, let's hope he publishes since there appear to be no citations of Rider's thesis a decade after it was published.
Seastead this.
If any article deserves a 'wishfulthinking' it's this one. Making a desktop fusor is not anything to do with generating electricity or solving our energy problems - it won't even break even. It's like expecting Michael Faraday at the turn of the 1900s to suddenly invent integrated circuits.
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
No shit. Well call me completely uninformed. I thought this stuff was still in the "it's impossible and you're crazy for saying it isn't" stage. Seriously.
I, for one, welcome our new teenage basement-dwelling fusion reactor overlords!
After the OMG Mystic Damascus Steel and things like this from the Zonk and Scuttlemonkey department perhaps it's time to move on. Anything else out there similar to Slashdot or are there just some filters I can try on this site to keep the psuedoscience down?
Surely we should be nuking this guy back to the stone age? Pesky axis of evil and their neuclear threats.
From RTFA:
From all I read he is more into engineering, iow applied science, not the science itself which is theoretical.
All hope abandon ye who enter here.
You think this is great? Wait until his parents get the electric bill. Then the excitement really begins.
... isnt this against the patriot act?
TASER HIM!
Now to figure out how to turn that ball of energy into Kelly LeBrock!
Didn't Tom Waits write a song about this guy?
http://www.theonion.com/content/node/30990
He'll being getting laid in quantity now, chicks dig guys with fusion reactors in their parents basement. Then again, you could score some if you have a PS3 also.
The PS3 and Wii have just come out and this 17year old nerd still has time left to build a fusion reactor?
This isn't cold fusion, as far as I can tell.
http://outcampaign.org/
he has to use 40,000v to create a small spark, how the fuck is that edging towards breaking even? looks like your still 40,000 volts from breaking even. this kid will probably die from cancer or something now.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
These fusion reactors produce net energy? I thought they didn't.
http://outcampaign.org/
Put a hose to the chamber and start sucking. If you get a high pitched squirrel voice, then you have successfully created helium
Now that is cool. Cook would have been my 2nd choice - now I'm working on my CS master. My mom would have preferred a cook though.
Apparently he made a plasma.
Apparently he is an idiot.
Fusion is the reaction which
drives the SUN.
IF he was able to produce an
actual fusion reaction, he was
incredibly stupid.
What if it was self-sustaining?
He never mentioned what he would
do for containment.
We would end up like the SUN,
a really hot glowing ball in orbit.
Making Global Warming seem tame.
This guy is the same type of guy
who thinks Star Trek transporters
are possible. Hogwash.
Well, assuming you're right handed, and zapped yourself pretty good when a lad, you probably dissipated quite a bit of heat in your right testis, which as everyone knows, is the male testis. Therefore, you're more likely to have girls.
Either that, or he's shitting you. One of the two.
Cue the standard response...
:-)
"Why make an almost asinine comment like this?"
You must be new here!
Seriously this is slashdot, made of up some genuinly interested people, and a bunch of bitter never-gonna-get-laid boring suck-the-life-out-of-everything spiritless erm... well you get what i'm saying
I would say "best just to ignore them" but hell, they even get to me from time to time.
The revolution will not be televised... but it will have a page on Wikipedia
Actually there are women I've run into now that I'm an adult who'd go for that sort of thing; pity I hadn't met any of them in high school :-)
*Then* he'll have to move the Mr. Fusion from the basement out to the garage...
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Arrest him please. He has forbidden knowledge.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
2 years in his basement trying to make something explode... maybe the kid just needs masturbation instructions.
I know this is off-topic, but when I hear people refer to the NRA as overheated and overpoliticized gun owners, I sigh, and think, "They didn't used to be...."
I remember when I was in Boy Scouts during the 1970's and I took the dreaded "Rifle and Shotgun" merit badge.
Back then, the NRA was a gun safety and training organization. They struck everyone as being straight-forward and calm, more interested in making sure that people knew how to prevent gun accidents and how to responsibly own firearms.
Then things changed, and they transformed themselves into a political organization - and now they're either seen as "the safeguard of the American way" or "crazy gun-toting fascists," depending on whose overheated rhetoric was heard last.
Perhaps this should be seen as a warning to other groups - once you enter the political fray, you become a political animal. Or in the words of the Punisher, "The means always screws up the ends."
Strike while the irony is hot! -- The Freethinker
... made of up some genuinly interested people ...
... wait, probably reinventing 1337 speak?
Starting to develop so much of ingenuity they even develop ways to leave out redundant letters,
CC.
TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
TVs have very dangerous capacitors. The function of capacitors that you unhappily discovered is something like a temporary battery.
See, a real battery can only push so much energy out per second (I think batteries are usually defined in milliamp hours (mAh)). So what you do is you start pushing charge (electrons) onto a capacitor, and then when you need a real big quick burst of energy (like, say, to shoot an electron at a TV screen) the cap can give you that high amount of current or voltage very quickly.
Another use is to smooth power signals. You're getting sent AC voltage in the wall, which oscillates above and below zero volts. This gets rectified at the home so that it's either above or at 0 volts. Then, this gets filtered through a series of capacitors (and lots of other stuff, too; Zener diodes FTW) to provide (more) consistent voltage, instead of a rising and falling voltage. In essence, it's acting as a battery for us while the voltage is lower than what the circuit needs.
Capacitors are also very important in analog filters and a lot of other Electrical Engineering voodoo.
:(){
The real question is where is this video on YouTube?
I can't believe you folks are so totally, utterly, abjectly disconnected from the literature!
http://www.theonion.com/content/node/30990
> widely used
...
But please not on earth. We have enough problems with radioactive waste. No need for more.
Fusion is a nice technology we want to have until we try to fly to different stars. But for earth it is the wrong technology, we have this gigantic free fusion reactor directly above us, which keeps the waste far away form us, which allows many nice ways to get out energy like sunlight, winds,
The kid is of course great. But the device he produced is usually called "neutron generator". This things were available commercially for decades. Just google for "neutron generator".
Maybe I'm just not jaded enough, but I didn't interpret his statement to be directed at the 17 year old... his statement seemed to be directed at the ever popular "they". As in, this is old news, and if a kid can do it (albeit a very smart kid) then why the fuck aren't "they" doing it in larger scales, and why are "they" still burning coal and oil ffs?
... unless I missed the whoosh...
Oh god, that woman is John Romero!
You don't just go down to the cornerstore and buy deuterium.
This is a Farnsworth Fusor. See Wikipedia at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fusor/ for info on this type of device, which is VERY OLD, reasonably well-characterized, and most definitely NOT an energy-generation device.
Fusors use far more power than they generate. The idea is a pair of spherical grids charged to 50K volts differential. Deuterium gas is a welding supply item. Gas hits the outer grid, ionizes, and is propelled at ultra-high speed to the exact center of the grid.
The drawback is the inefficiencies: There is no known design (and some theoretical work saying it is impossible to a achieve such a design) which does not have significant heat losses to impacts of the gas on the inner grid. This generates random gas, which impedes the movement of the ions, etc.
It is also known as Electrostatic fusion.
Unitarian Church: Freethinkers Congregate!
I'm not sure what alpha male you've been spying on in the changing room, but even with my limited knowledge of other men's packages, I can safely say that there's only supposed to be ONE "wrinkled brown sack." If yours come individually wrapped you should consider yourself a frea...unique snowflake.
...he didn't do it by taking apart a bunch of smoke detectors.
"It's time to take life by the cans." ~ Bender ("Bendin' in the Wind", ep. 3-13)
In the not to distant future... "Wow!!! Lake Chicago is really big mom...."
Touché!
Or do I mean, "touchy"?
The revolution will not be televised... but it will have a page on Wikipedia
I won't even let *my* kids go near the toaster for fear of them burning the f*king house down!
> Hopefully this points to a future where large scale fusion reactors are both economical and widely used.
I hope not. Transportation of energy is not efficient. Bad for your wallet and bad for the air you breath.
There was this other kid who built a nuclear reactor in his mom's basement (I almost did the same thing back in the 70s until my folks found out and put a stop to it) and he got in huge trouble and his mom's property was declared a nuclear clean up site. So how is it that this kid did anything different by making what COULD have been a fusion reactor. If he'd succeeded, I imagine this wouldn't be "Well golly gee" news, he would have been "disappeared" to Gitmo, had a few gay marines sodomize him and General Dynamics would get a government contract from the Bush administration for their "innovative research" into fusion devices. Which would then be made very illegal and would take at least 50 years to make it to market while we drain every last drop of oil from the middle east.
On that note, when the oil in the middle east eventually dries up and there's no more economic advantage to protecting our interests there, what do you want to bet that we just wind up nuking what's left? Of course, not until after we steal anything of value, rape the women and savage the men and kids as conquerors are wont to do. Trust me, the middle east is going to be a cinder once they've outlived their usefulness to the capitalist thugs.
You can read a review here. If you don't feel like jumping the link, then welcome to slashdot, the home of hyperbole.
:wq ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Where did he get the deuterium? Did he just buy it in the walmart?
Building your own fusion reactor in your basement isn't science - it's fraud. I call fake.
While there are a lot of comments about this being a well-known device for fusion, it seems the practical application of this is a neutron source. The experience of actually building the machine is invaluable. If you've ever built something complex, you know that simply knowing about how something is built and actually having built it are very different things. By building, he's likely gained a lot of practical knowledge that can be applied to future projects. He could describe the process, drawing from his own experience instead of just what he's read.
Newsorthy? Not necessarily, but that's no reason to make it seem like what he's done is without merit.
"No one likes working in a hamster wheel, and your shop smells of cedar shavings from here." - TaleSpinner
In related news: A huge explosion in Michigan destoyed 35 square miles of the city.
This is cool news though. I mean, If a 17 year old kid can construct soemthing like this in his parents basement it really makes me start wondering why we are still using dirty fuels.
God Be Gone
Correct, Farnsworth Fusors are "hot" fusion devices. They use intense electromagnetic fields to accelerate particles rather than lasers or other more fanciful methods, but the end result is the same.
Are you sure they we're quoting an episode from Sliders?
Really, it's that pesky part where we try to actually make it produce energy and break even that is stumping us right now.
I just had a vision of highschool physics teachers showing one of these things at the beginning of the school year and saying to the class: "Any one want a nobel prize? Figure out how to make this produce more energy than you put in, and you'll be in the running." I remember my phyics teacher. He would have done just for the class reaction and to see if anyone actually would try to improve it.
Didn't we just have an article about some guy making a Farnsworth Fusor in his garage last week? How's this kid any different?
Signatures are a waste of bandwi (buffering...)
And people keep telling us that USA kids don't do science. Shit.
Shh, you aren't allowed to tell anyone outside the US our secret. We've never stopped doing science. It's just that this kid won't be remembered and used as an example to follow by the student body. That sports team that once made it to state or actually won at state; those guys the teachers and students can name most of them off the top of their head. We still have lots of kids that do science and think that its fun, but you'll hardly hear about it except maybe on slashdot, because "science is boring" and we don't have half-time cheerleaders and a band supporting us.
Typically, the best hyperbolic articles are typed on a Comodore Amiga while in unsuspended animation inside a hyperbolic chamber, also known as "Mom's basement"...
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
BTW I didn't mean to cause upset with my analogy. In general, you wouldn't expect NRA members to shoot their ex-wives because it would give ammunition to the anti-gun lobby. I was just looking for an example of a conflicted person in possession of a potentially dangerous device, since if anybody ever finds a male teenager without inner conflicts, he will have stopped breathing some time previously. It was meant to be light hearted, not an attack on the NRA. Since I stopped being a frequent visitor to the US a few years back, everything seems (from this side of the pond) to have become much more polarised.
Pining for the fjords
The key here is that he had "some help" from his dad. I've seen this before, its so common. Parents completing 4-H projects, and sumbmitting them for the children. Boyscott dads completing wooden race cars for the kids, and submitting them as if the kid did it him/herself. I'm looking at this thing, and the amount of tools including metal milling equipment are beyond what most "children" have access to, let alone the ability to use them effectively.
Sadly, this young man is being set up for failure, as once his dad is not there to help him, he will fall below average compared to those kids who do things on their own. This is the type of kid that ends up working at a gas station, stoned once highschool is over and he is sent out on his own.
While I am impressed with the reactor, I am not impressed that it was built by his dad and submitted as if his son did it all. Not believing it for a second. As I said, seen it a millions times before, related to "helicopter parenting"
Or do I mean, "touchy"?
:)
Maybe "techy" would have made it as well (considering the general context
CC.
TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
Look it up.
It's only the most amazing invention ever. Geesh!
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
I was, of course, referring to peer reviewed scientific publication rather than simple mention in discussions on the Internet, when I said there had been no citation of Rider's work in its 10 years of publication.
Seastead this.
Envy looks good on you. I bet you wear it constantly.
Slashdot - where whining about luck is the new way to make the world you want.
Being such a geek would probably prevent him from procreating before said fusion reaction.
www.qsopht.com ~q
"Someday, I'll build a death-ray! Then they'll all be sorry they laughed at me!
Stupid coach."
"Speaking the Truth in times of universal deceit is a revolutionary act." -- George Orwell
Not in TFA: Where the heck does a 17 year old get hold of Deuterium?
The main industrial use of the Farnsworth Fusor is as a neutron source. Anyone trying this at home needs to understand that the neutron flux near the reactor can be deadly. (Wikipedia says amateur Fusors generate about 3x10^5 neutrons / sec.) Fortunately, they escape in all directions, so the density falls with the square of the distance. Just don't get too close while it's running. It's a good idea to have a detector for ionizing radiation and be familiar with exposure levels humans can tolerate. (Any good links?) Remember the neutron bomb? Killed people - not things.
You think this kid's cool? I was putting DiHydrogen Monoxide into a pneumatic device and blasting it at passerby before I could walk!
Only his tendency toward a dazed stupor prevented him from screaming aloud.
It was a typo or a lack of understanding by the reporter. I strongly suspect that it was a hyperbaric chamber, which means a high-pressure chamber. Those can be quite dangerous if not built correctly -- just imagine the thing blowing apart like a balloon, but with metal instead of rubber.
First rule of trauma: Bleeding always stops.
We can't do everything. Especially when there've been gangs of people building these devices in their garages for decades: http://fusor.net/ If he built himself a radio should it be in the news too?
Why is this posted in /. ?
Its not news. Its a toy. It generates a few neutrons. Big deal. It's not going to become a power source. So what is this "hopefully"? Hopefully I will live forever. I would love to believe in fantacy. Alas I have to slog it out in reality.
Whilst I am sure your son will be proud of such a stout defence, I think that even he may think you went a little overboard there..
This is a trivial experiment. Anyone with a supply of a pure gas and a high-energy voltage source can do the same experiment. The kid has good PR.
Heavy water by itself would be totally useless for any type of bomb. It'd be about as useful as ordinary water. A fusion bomb requires a rather large fission bomb as the trigger, as there is no way to create a fusion chain reaction without a great deal of energy input.
The device is little more than a neon or fluorescent light with neon replaced by deuterium.
C'mon, get a life. The kid's got good PR. He called it "fusion" and his family and town are merely promoting it.
Ignorance is power. In first grade I held a vacuum tube in my hand and threatened a bully with it: "It's an atom bomb: hit me and I'll blow you up!" The bully backed down and never bothered me again. Power is an incredible rush.
Do you think that the feds are telling you what they are interested in? Based on how the feds and our country has acted over the last 5 years, I am amazed that he is still living at home. Perhaps Nov. 7th has already changed a few things and brought a few back to reality.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Many high school science fair projects perform some experiements they teach in college genetic lab classes. In not afraid of high school Frankensteins yet. But this is close to science fiction in my view. Sometimes I wish I was a kid again and had such access to technology at that age.
Dear Citizen,
It has been noted that you have achieved nuclear ability. Congratulations on joining this ELITE club!
Please note that you have been added to the axis of evil. You will be contacting shortly!
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"(I) have this unfortunate condition that causes me not to believe a single thing any politician says when a mic's on.
My mom never let me build a nuclear reactor :(
Groening named the one in honor of the other.
All employees must wash hands before seeking equitable relief.
I can make plasma with a carboned up candle and a microwave oven. I wonder if I can sell it to george W. bush as a
.. I can tell George W. .. no it's a time machine.
nuclear fusion device.. HahahahahahhHa
And.. my AOL CD incinerator..
He just made an expensive plasma generator. I can do the same thing for much cheaper with an old microwave.
A lot of people don't often say "thank you" when something has been done either, appreciation is only within themselves or as far as the arms can reach.
...
;)
Having appreciation of the quality what someone else can do (for you) is something badly valued...
It falls under exactly the same category; try to be happy there are still people like you and me caring about how science (can better) work(s) for you.
Do also mind almost all research which is sponsored by the government will have classified information towards the normal citizen; the corporate culture is being protected well as you can see with patents, laws and acts making a true innovation a lot more difficult in current society.
Experiments which could be against such corporate greed -- errrr sorry, typo: society/government (based on fear, propaganda and protecting the "homeland" for "diccidents who think dangerously against such society") could also stop such research if we, the normal people, don't keep ourself busy improving our own back yard...
I can only thank the parent poster for pushing forward this topic where you should really see this as an achievement of a young mind, where Einstein and lots others have been too when they where young before; not everyone can bake bread or create a Fusion Device (in a (fully) safe way, that's something I got my doubts about too) in his basement
Still, Einstein lived in a time with other corporate ethics, when things in the mind couldn't be forbidden to think about unlawfully
--- I am known for the ones who want to find me on the net. Is that a privacy risk or a privilege? One might wonder..
Look into some of the westinghouse winners of the past, young people who did independent research in new areas of science. Building a farnsworth generator doesn't even compare.
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From the article: "Originally, he wanted to build a hyperbolic chamber," [His mother] said, adding that she promptly said no.
Now that would have been the best science project ever.
Unless she meant to say hyperbaric chamber. Which is way less interesting.
Craig Wallace. http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.02/start.htm l?pg=6 I tried building my own once, but stopped about $400 in when I realized that I still needed another $600 or so. There is a fair bit of technical knowledge required, but if you search fusor.net you can find step-by-step instructions for everything from spot welding inner grids to diffusion pumping to machining your custom-made 8" conflats. It's all about how much money you have.
Don't sweat the neutrons. If you stand near an operating fusor of the hobbiest sort the X-rays will give you a to-the-core-sunburn long before the trivial neutron flux will do any worrisome harm.
(Of course sitting for hours on a heavy steel vacuum chamber that can stop the X-rays but not be too worrysome to the neutrons isn't recommended. B-) )
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Don't sweat the neutrons. If you stand near an operating fusor of the hobbiest sort the X-rays will give you a to-the-core-sunburn long before the trivial neutron flux will do any worrisome harm.
Actually, it's not all THAT trivial so DO sweat the neutrons. (My post was intended to point out that the X-rays are a stronger and more immediate hazard. I worded it poorly.)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Can be found here
I read that and assumed that she meant a sensory deprivation or isolation tank--commonly associated with a hyperbaric chamber.
the NPG electrode was replaced with carbon blac
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ya9-cpas5eA
mod me funny
This Philo Farnsworth device has been in the news for over 50 years. It seems to get renewed every 4 years, as new students discover it and old students give up on it. No-one has been able to go any farther with it.
It was in the garage.
When will the IAEA be knocking on his door?
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Back in high school electronics one of the rules was to always make sure that the capacitors were discharged before use. In our class it became a very good idea to follow. If someone went out to the bathroom, often we would take a couple of the capacitors that were on their bench and charge them up. FYI - these were small enough to not be truly harmful but they would hurt like a bitch. It was always fun seeing people scream, and talk about their hands being numb.
Small minded government bureaucracy, data insecurity, petty crime, and an economy funded by house price rises, immigration and "financial services". I live here because (a) I have family and (b) I've made enough to live on and (c) I have a house in a good part of the country, but where there are few jobs. I really feel sorry for the rising generation.
Pining for the fjords
Here's a nickel, kid. Go buy yourself a new name.
Hey people how bout the slashdot article here http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/11/ 18/0616205 from saturday night. Geez, how short is everyons attention span?
maybe this kid will be encourged to go into nuclear fusion. Maybe creating the first fusion generater with a surplus?
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
"A Damn funny lesson to behold."
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
They're indirectly ionizing radiation. They themselves are neutral, but they can cause things to emit high energy photons (e.g. x-rays) that can in turn ionize things (by knocking an electron off of some atom).
Also, more troubling is neutron activation--neutrons absorbed by atomic nuclei can change the element into a radioactive isotope which will cause problems on its own.
That said, you can still create shielding to manage all of these problems. The primary shielding materials would be water and boron to catch the neutrons, and metal to take care of any x-rays induced. Thankfully, the people who know how to build this stuff would (hopefully) know how shield things properly. Although, there was that one guy who made himself a neutron source ("breeder reactor") and went around irradiating crap in MI until the NRC found out and cleaned things up, so who knows...
[Note: Most of the information above was gleaned from Wikipedia. If, for whatever reason, you actually try to build any of this stuff, please contact trained professionals for help. And a lawyer--for all I know some experiments are probably illegal.]
that no one has mentioned the Farnsworth Fusor...
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
If Stephen Hawking can find a wife and procreate, and Bill Gates can, I'm sure this kid can.
I felt so encouraged to read about the work and enthusiasm for science of this 17 year old, until I reached the let-down in the story, "someday he hopes to work for the federal government".
It is great to have a teenager doing interesting things, the bunny knows most of them should be doing so.
But it really should not be newsworthy since so many other people are pointing out, it is something not really new.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
cool, am gonna write me that one down :-p
The revolution will not be televised... but it will have a page on Wikipedia