Robert W. Bussard
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'''Robert W. Bussard''' ([[August 11]] [[1928]] – [[October 6]] [[2007]]) was an [[United States|American]] [[physicist]] who worked primarily in [[nuclear fusion]] [[energy]] research. He was the recipient of the Schreiber-Spence Achievement Award for STAIF-2004.<ref>[http://www.unm.edu/~isnps/staifarchives/staif2004.html STAIF-2004 Archives]</ref> He was also a fellow of the [[International Academy of Astronautics]].
== Kiwi (Rover-A) ==
In [[1956]], Bussard designed the [[nuclear thermal rocket]] known as project Rover.
Two important monographs on nuclear propulsion were written by Bussard and DeLauer:
*Nuclear Rocket Propulsion<ref name="Nuc Prop">
{{Citation
| last = Bussard
| first = R. W.
| last2 = DeLauer
| first2 = R.D.
| title = Nuclear Rocket Propulsion
| publisher = McGraw-Hill
| year = 1958}}
</ref>.
*Fundamentals of Nuclear Flight<ref name="Nuc Flight">
{{Citation
| last = Bussard
| first = R.W.
| last2 = DeLauer
| first2 = R. D.
| title = Fundamentals of Nuclear Flight
| publisher = McGraw-Hill
| year = 1965}}
</ref>.
== Bussard Ramjet ==
In [[1960]], Bussard conceived of the [[Bussard ramjet]], an interstellar [[outer space|space]] drive powered by [[hydrogen]] fusion using hydrogen collected with a [[magnetic field]] from the interstellar [[gas]]. Due to the presence of high-energy particles throughout space, much of the [[Interstellar medium|interstellar hydrogen]] exists in an [[ion]]ized state (H II regions) that can be manipulated by [[magnetic field|magnetic]] or [[electric field]]s. Bussard proposed using a large magnet to "scoop" up the ionized hydrogen and funnel it into a fusion reactor, using the exhaust from the reactor as a rocket engine. Since it would pick up its fuel from space, there was no apparent upper limit to the speed such a craft could achieve.There is an upper limit set by unavoidable transverse radiation from the hydrogen captured in the fusion process.
It appears the energy gain in the reactor must be extremely high for the ramjet to work at all; any hydrogen picked up by the scoop must be sped up to the same speed as the ship in order to provide thrust, and the energy required to do so increases with the ship's speed. [[Proton-proton chain reaction|Hydrogen itself]] does not fuse very well at all (unlike deuterium, which is rare in the interstellar medium), and so cannot be used directly to produce energy, a fact which accounts for the billion-year scale of stellar lifetimes. This problem was solved, in principle, according to Dr. Bussard by use of the stellar CNO-Bicycle in which carbon is used as a catalyst to burn hydrogen via the strong nuclear reaction (Whitmire, D. "Relativistic spaceflight and the catalytic nuclear ramjet", Acta Astronautica, 2, 497-509, 1975). This cycle occurs in the sun but is more important in higher mass stars. The improvement over the weak PPI
chain is a factor of 10^16 .
Since the time of Bussard's original proposal, it has been discovered that the region surrounding the sun has much lower density of interstellar hydrogen than was believed at that time. This is of concern only because it requires larger scoops to collect the fuel required. Other studies (see [[Magnetic sail]]) have contended that drag will exceed thrust from such scoop designs. However, these neglected the momentum-conserving aspect of mirror capture and mirror reflection in the collection and exhaust streams of such systems.
This theoretical device description was used with good understanding and elaboration on the advantages and limitations of such a drive in [[science fiction]] novels by [[Poul Anderson]]: [[Tau Zero]] and [[Larry Niven]]: [[Protector (novel)|Protector]] and other of his [[Known Space]] stories.
A highly fictionalized variation of this concept, called the ''Bussard Hydrogen Collector'' or ''Bussard Ramscoop'' appears in the [[Star Trek]] saga as part of the [[deuterium|matter]]/[[antimatter]] propulsion system that allows [[Starfleet]] ships to travel [[Faster-than-light|faster than the speed of light]]. In the saga, the ramscoops attach to the front of the ''warp nacelles'', where (when the ship's internal supply of deuterium runs critically low) they collect interstellar hydrogen and convert it to deuterium and anti-deuterium for use as the primary fuel in a starship's ''[[Warp drive (Star Trek)|warp drive]]''.
== Atomic Energy Commission ==
In the early 1970s Dr. Bussard became Assistant Director under Director [[Robert L. Hirsch|Robert Hirsch]] at the Controlled Thermonuclear Reaction Division of what was then known as the [[Atomic Energy Commission]]. They founded the mainline fusion program for the United States: the [[Tokamak]]. In June [[1995]], Bussard claimed in a letter to all fusion laboratories, as well as to key members of the US Congress, that he and the other founders of the program supported the Tokamak not out of conviction that it was the best technical approach but rather as a vehicle for generating political support, thereby allowing them to pursue "all the hopeful (sic) new things the mainline labs would not try". [http://www.geocities.com/jim_bowery/BussardsLetter.html Bussard's Letter]
== International Nuclear Energy Systems Corporation ==
With fellow researcher [[Bruno Coppi]], Bussard later founded [[International Nuclear Energy Systems Corporation|Inesco]], a private firm funded in part by ''[[Penthouse Magazine]]'' publisher [[Bob Guccione]]. Inesco set out to build small power-producing [[Tokamak]] [[fusion reactor]]s called [[Riggatron]]s using methods developed from the [[MIT]] [[Alcator]] research Tokamaks, and based on proven engineering heat/power capabilities from the aerospace industry.
The device was a very small, normal copper, water-cooled system, with a lifetime of about 30-60 days, before death by neutron destruction of the first wall (of the magnets). It was thought that the system could be made economically attractive even though it was short-lived, because the fusion core was so small and cheap that it could be replaced, like a giant light bulb - with relative (to conventional large-scale Tokamaks) ease and low cost.
A test site had been selected and approved by the authorities, but never implemented. Development had proved difficult and costly, so that funds could not be found to build the $200 million test facility and test system, ending the program. It was shortly co-opted by the [[Department of Energy]] which renamed the system and held 2 national and 1 international conferences on it. This line of development was then transferred to Princeton, as TNX or The Next Step. Under Princeton the program was expanded and given greater funding, but an efficient working system like that originally envisioned has proven elusive. It still survives today, now called CIT (Compact Ignition Torus) within the PPPL/DoE framework.
== Energy Matter Conversion Corporation ==
Together with his wife, Dolly H. Gray, Bussard co-founded a company (Energy Matter Conversion Corporation (EMC²) in 1984, to exploit his invention (in 1983) of a new method of inertial electrostatic confinement fusion. This was initially funded privately, then by the DoD [[SDIO, DNA, DARPA]] contract funding. This was a variant of the electric configuration published by Elmere, Tuck and Watson in the late 1950s, which was an inversion of that used by Farnsworth and Hirsch in later work, [[Inertial Electrostatic Confinement]] (IEC) [[Philo Farnsworth|Farnsworth]]-[[Robert L. Hirsch|Hirsch]] [[fusor]].
In an [[Analog magazine|Analog]] magazine article, fellow fusion researcher [[Tom Ligon]] described an easily-built demonstration fusor system along with some of Bussard's ideas for fusion reactors and incredibly powerful [[spacecraft propulsion]] systems, with which spacecraft could swiftly move throughout the solar system.<ref name="Analog Magazine">
{{Citation
| last = Ligon
| first = Tim
| author-link =
| last2 = Bussard
| first2 = Robert
| author2-link =
| title = ''The World's Simplest Fusion Reactor: How To Make It Work''
| journal = Analog Magazine
|date=December 12
| year = 1988}}
</ref>
=== The Polywell ===
{{main|Polywell}}
Bussard worked on a promising new type of gridless IEC fusor, called the [[Polywell]], and built and tested several (15) experimental devices, from 1994 through 2006. The U.S. Navy contract funding that supported the work expired while experiments were still small. However, the final tests of the last device, WB-6, reputedly solved the last remaining physics problem just as the funding expired and the EMC² labs had to be shut down.
=== Appeal for Funding ===
During 2006 and 2007, Bussard sought the large-scale funding necessary to design and construct a full-scale Polywell fusion power plant. His fusor design is feasible enough, he asserted, to render unnecessary the construction of larger and larger test models still too small to achieve [[Fusion energy gain factor|break-even]]. Also, the scaling of power with size goes as the seventh power of the machine radius, while the gain scales as the fifth power, so there is little incentive to build half-scale systems; one might as well build the real thing.
On [[March 29]] [[2006]], Bussard claimed on the fusor.net internet forum that EMC² has developed an [[inertial electrostatic confinement]] fusion process that was 100,000 times more efficient than previous designs, but that the US Navy budget line item that supported the work was zero-funded in FY2006.<ref name="fusor.net">{{cite web | title = ''Inertial Electrostatic Fusion systems can now be built'' | author = Robert W. Bussard | date = [[2006-03-29]] | work = fusor.net forums | url = http://www.fusor.net/board/view.php?site=fusor&bn=fusor_announce&key=1143684406 | accessdate = 2007-02-22 }}</ref>
Bussard provided more details of his breakthrough and the circumstances surrounding the end of his Navy funding in a letter to the ''James Randi Educational Foundation'' internet forum on June 23.<ref name="randi">{{cite web | title = ''Fusion, eh?'' | author = SirPhilip (posting an e-mail from "RW Bussard") | date = [[2006-06-23]] | work = [[James Randi Educational Foundation]] forums | url = http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=58665#27 | accessdate = 2007-02-22 }}</ref>
From October 2, 2006 to October 6, 2006, Bussard presented an informal overview of the previous decade of his work at the 57th International Astronautical Congress.<ref>[http://www.askmar.com/ConferenceNotes/2006-9%20IAC%20Paper.pdf ''The Advent of Clean Nuclear Fusion: Super-performance Space Power and Propulsion''], Robert W. Bussard, Ph. D., 57th International Astronautical Congress, October 2-6, 2006.</ref> This was the first publication of this work in 11 years, as the U.S. Navy had put an embargo on publications of the research, in [[1994]].
Dr. Bussard presented further details of his IEC fusion research at a Google Tech Talk on [[November 9]] [[2006]], of which a video was widely circulated.<ref name="google">{{cite web | url = http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=1996321846673788606 | title = ''Should Google Go Nuclear? Clean, cheap, nuclear power (no, really)'' | author = Dr. Robert Bussard (lecturer) | accessdate = 2006-12-03 | date = [[2006-11-09]] | format = [[Adobe Flash|Flash]] video | work = Google Tech Talks | publisher = [[Google]] }}</ref>
Bussard presented more of his thoughts on the potential world impact of fusion power at a [[Yahoo!]] Tech Talk on April 10, 2007.<ref>[http://www.askmar.com/Fusion.html ''Askmar summary of IEC fusion'']</ref>
(The video is only available internally for Yahoo employees.) He also spoke on the internet talk radio show ''The Space Show'' on [[May 8]] [[2007]].
He founded a non-profit organization to solicit tax-deductible donations to restart the work in [[2007]]. The organization is EMC2 Fusion Development Corporation, web site is [http://emc2fusion.org/ EMC2Fusion.org]
<ref>{{cite episode
| title = [http://www.thespaceshow.com/ The Space Show]
| credits = Hosted by Dr. David Livingston
| airdate = 2007-05-08
| number = [http://archived.thespaceshow.com/detail.asp?q=709 709] with guests Dr. Robert W Bussard, Thomas A Ligon
| minutes =
}}</ref>
== Death ==
Bussard died from [[cancer]] on [[October 6]] [[2007]] at age 79.
<ref>{{cite web|title=
''Dr. Robert W. Bussard Has Passed''|url=http://www.classicalvalues.com/archives/2007/10/dr_robert_w_bus.html|date=2007-10-08|accessdate=2007-10-09|work=Classical Values|author=M. Simon}}</ref> His work will continue as funding was arranged and received on August 21, 2007 and he was able to create a staff of physicists to continue.
==References==
{{reflist}}
== See also ==
*[[Tokamak]]
*[[Bussard ramjet]]
*[[Polywell]]
*[[fusor|Farnsworth Fusor]]
==External links==
* [http://www.science.edu/TechoftheYear/TechoftheYear.htm Inertial-Electrodynamic Fusion (IEF) Device - Energy/Matter Conversion Corporation (EMC2)]
* [http://www.emc2fusion.org Bussard's website, asking for donations to fund further research]
* [http://fti.neep.wisc.edu/iec/AmericanScientist.htm American Scientist article mentioning the founding of EMC2]
* [http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8301617273665558256 Economic Impact of Cheap Fusion - 3 minutes of excerpts from Bussard's Google Tech Talk Video]
* [http://unjobs.org/authors/robert-w.-bussard Bussard documents and sources]
* [http://www.askmar.com/Robert%20Bussard/Omni%20Interview.pdf "Robert Bussard Interview," by K.C. Cole, Omni Magazine, January 1981]
* [http://www.askmar.com/Robert%20Bussard/1984%20The%20Entrepreneurs.pdf Chapter 7 (The Entrepreneurs) from "The Man-Made Sun — The Quest for Fusion Power," by Thomas A. Heppenheimer, 1984]
*[http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/06/12/1136887.aspx Latest Fusion developments (WB-7 - June 2008) based on the work of Dr. Robert Bussard]
{{BD|1928|2007|Bussard, Robert W.}}
[[Category:American nuclear physicists]]
[[Category:American scientists]]
[[Category:Cancer deaths]]
[[Category:Nuclear fusion]]
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