Progress and status
New ignition method and new patent application
In 1995, after a Dutch TV broadcast on Convectron activities, a spectator communicated his first-hand experience with high-voltage fireball generation occurring repeatedly in a 1960’s laser test facility. This new ignition method will be a primary focus of the research and development activities ahead. It is also the basis for a new patent application, which is in preparation and is expected to be submitted by the end of 2010.
Together, these developments firmly ground the Convectron fusion reactor concept in established gas dynamic and microwave technologies, as well as in emerging technologies for the fields of left-handed materials (which have negative permittivity and permeability, and thereby a negative refractive index) and photonics (which combines different fields of science, including in particular optics, laser technology and electronics, for the generation, manipulation and use of light for a wide variety of applications; a well-know application is data transmission via light beams through optical fibres).
Full and rigorous mathematical description
The Convectron model stands out by its robust mathematical framework unifying population statistics, binding forces and energy conversion in the ball, including nuclear fusion of atmospheric deuterium. Log-normal statistics connects usual life-times (several seconds) with exceptional life-times (above one minute) of high-energy ball lightning. Well-documented widths and colour of haloes observed around one high-energy event visualise free ranges for charges produced from deuterium-deuterium reactions.
Halo colours match blue Cherenkov light from nuclear fission reactors submerged in water. Polaroid sun glasses will suffice to identify such radiation directly by eyesight. Power output at commercial levels merely demands raising the deuterium concentration by a factor of one hundred above moist air. Scale rules quantify the road map towards a definite proof of principle, and beyond towards demonstration of a working prototype reactor.
