4 ms·
The Rio red variety was not developed in 2007. It was developed in the 1980s, in, you guessed it: Rio, Brazil. When I first heard about this some handful of yea
by superkuh 5y ago
The Rio red variety was not developed in 2007. It was developed in the 1980s, in, you guessed it: Rio, Brazil. When I first heard about this some handful of years ago I was naturally curious about how a researcher in Rio in the 1980s had access to thermal neutrons without a fission reactor. After a lot of reference digging and discussion on physics forums we came to the conclusion it was most likely a penning trap style fusor with some thick moderator. The Mars Curiosity rover also had/has a penning style trap for generating neutrons to probe for underground water sources.
- pfdietz 5y agoWhat makes you think "Penning Trap"? Neutron generator tubes have been used since forever in the oil well logging industry. They use an electric field to accelerate deuterium ions into a solid target containing deuterium or tritium. As far as I know, fusors have never been commercially successful as neutron generators. Also, why would one use neutrons for plant mutagenesis? Photons are far easier to make. An x-ray tube will produce a given (biologically effective) dose at a very small fraction of the cost of a neutron generator.
- pfdietz 5y agoThe Curiosity neutron source is indeed a conventional pulsed sealed-tube neutron source, not a Penning trap. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/5253560_The_Dynamic_Albedo_of_Neutrons_DAN_experiment_for_NASA's_2009_Mars_Science_Laboratory https://www.researchgate.net/publication/5253560_The_Dynamic...
- superkuh 5y agoSorry I wasn't clear. The DAN and other pulsed sealed tube neutron sources use a penning trap for their ion sources. But yeah, it was an incomplete and inaccurate wording.