There is a recent comment (Ciuchi et al., 2012) concerning the theory of collective many body effects on the neutron production rates in a chemical battery cathode. Ciuchi et al employ an inverse beta decay expression that contains a two body amplitu
de. Only one electron and one proton may exist in the Ciuchi et al model initial state wave function. A flaw in their reasoning is that one cannot in reality describe collective many body correlations with only a two particle wave function. One needs very many particles to describe collective effects. In the model wave functions of Ciuchi et al there are no metallic hydrides, there are no cathodes and there are no chemical batteries. Employing a wave function with only one electron and one proton is inadequate for describing collective metallic hydride surface quantum plasma physics in cathodes accurately.
In a series of papers, cited in the main body of the paper below, detailed calculations have been presented which show that electromagnetic and weak interactions can induce low energy nuclear reactions to occur with observable rates for a variety of
processes. A common element in all these applications is that the electromagnetic energy stored in many relatively slow moving electrons can -under appropriate circumstances- be collectively transferred into fewer, much faster electrons with energies sufficient for the latter to combine with protons (or deuterons, if present) to produce neutrons via weak interactions. The produced neutrons can then initiate low energy nuclear reactions through further nuclear transmutations. The aim of this paper is to extend and enlarge upon various examples analyzed previously, present simplified order of magnitude estimates for each and to illuminate a common unifying theme amongst all of them.
Collective Ampere law interactions producing magnetic flux tubes piercing through sunspots into and then out of the solar corona allow for low energy nuclear reactions in a steady state and high energy particle reactions if a magnetic flux tube explo
des in a violent event such as a solar flare. Filamentous flux tubes themselves are vortices of Ampere currents circulating around in a tornado fashion in a roughly cylindrical geometry. The magnetic field lines are parallel to and largely confined within the core of the vortex. The vortices may thereby be viewed as long current carrying coils surrounding magnetic flux and subject to inductive Faraday and Ampere laws. These laws set the energy scales of (i) low energy solar nuclear reactions which may regularly occur and (ii) high energy electro-weak interactions which occur when magnetic flux coils explode into violent episodic events such as solar flares or coronal mass ejections.
Hagelstein and Chaudhary have recently criticized our low energy nuclear reaction rates in chemical cells based on our computed electron mass renormalization for surface electrons of metal hydride electrodes. They further criticize our electron mass
renormalization in exploding wire systems which is very strange because mass renormalization was {em never even mentioned} in our exploding wire work. Here we show that the calculations of Hagelstein and Chaudhary are erroneous in that they are in conflict with the Gauss law, i.e. they have arbitrarily removed all Coulomb interactions in electromagnetic propagators. They have also ignored substantial Ampere interactions in favor of computing only totally negligible contributions. When the fallacious considerations of Hagelstein and Chaudhary are clearly exposed, it becomes evident that our previous calculations remain valid.
Nuclear transmutations and fast neutrons have been observed to emerge from large electrical current pulses passing through wire filaments which are induced to explode. The nuclear reactions may be explained as inverse beta transitions of energetic el
ectrons absorbed either directly by single protons in Hydrogen or by protons embedded in other more massive nuclei. The critical energy transformations to the electrons from the electromagnetic field and from the electrons to the nuclei are best understood in terms of coherent collective motions of the many flowing electrons within a wire filament. Energy transformation mechanisms have thus been found which settle a theoretical paradox in low energy nuclear reactions which has remained unresolved for over eight decades. It is presently clear that nuclear transmutations can occur under a much wider range of physical conditions than was heretofore thought possible.
