Research starts with PhD students

Chapter 250 This thing is terrible!

Liu Honglei's words were a bit exaggerated, making several teachers feel a little unbelievable.

One hundred billion is too little compared to the entire country's anti-missile system spending.

It's just a drop in the bucket.

Facing the distrustful looks of several teachers, Liu Honglei explained excitedly, "We need to consider the attack range of the ion cannon!"

"The ion cannon has a very high accuracy rate against missiles within an altitude of 1000 kilometers and with a speed not exceeding Mach 10."

"If the distance of the ion cluster path is increased to 2000 kilometers, the strike accuracy will be reduced, but for missiles at Mach 10, the hit rate is still more than 25%."

"Therefore, the minimum effective radiation radius of an ion cannon is more than one thousand kilometers. If an ion cannon is installed in Donggang, it can effectively radiate the entire eastern coast."

The three teachers listened attentively, and their eyes became brighter and brighter.

The ion cannon has low manufacturing and launching costs, but very high performance, with a radiation diameter of up to 3000 kilometers.

It is only 3000 kilometers from Hainan to the capital. In other words, an ion cannon installed in a central city can cover the entire country. Scientific planning can increase the overlapping coverage of multiple ion cannons.

The most important thing is that the ion cannon's defense coverage is large enough.

If the plan is to lay out the defense system for the entire country, it is definitely not necessary to build hundreds or thousands of them at once. Instead, they will be manufactured and laid out in batches, and will also be coordinated with the existing defense system.

For example, by building dozens or hundreds of ion cannons a year, we can gradually have a more sophisticated defense system.

Once you have hundreds, thousands, or even more ion cannons, you can still effectively destroy all incoming targets even when facing coverage attacks from medium- and long-range missiles.

Such a defense system cannot guarantee absolute safety, but it can be described as "very tight" and can be said to be sufficient to cope with any war needs.

In fact, what the teachers value most is the ability to deal with intercontinental missiles.

If it is just a medium-range missile, the existing military system has many countermeasures. The layout of coastal areas is relatively tight, and it is even difficult for the opponent to break through the defense with medium-range missiles.

Teacher Zhao still commented, "One hundred billion is still a bit too little. It doesn't include the auxiliary system, it's just the ion cannon."

The auxiliary systems he mentioned naturally include radar, satellite and other facilities.

The ion cannon is highly dependent on radar satellites, and the target must be positioned very accurately.

If more ion cannons are to be deployed, the radar satellite system will definitely need to be upgraded. It is hard to say how much the cost will be, but it is easy to double it.

Of course, it's all worth it.

"This way we have a safety guarantee. The ion cannon is great!" Teacher Wang gave a positive evaluation with emotion.

The three teachers came here not just for a visit and inspection.

Liu Honglei also prepared a "special" program, which is to continue to attack the target satellite. Because he has applied for a tracking satellite, if he successfully hits the target satellite, he will be able to take clear photos and even video images.

The ion cannon test firing experiment is conducted once every two hours.

Several teachers did not wait in the control room, but visited the laboratories and equipment rooms and gained a deep understanding of the technology.

Zhang Shuo accompanied the whole visit to the experimental base, and he and Tong Zhiguo introduced the "nuclear force splitting technology".

After listening to the technical information, Mr. Wang asked in confusion, "This technology can turn large atoms into small atoms. Doesn't that mean... it can make gold?"

"Theoretically it's possible."

Zhang Shuo smiled and said, "I remember a professor said the same thing last time in the capital, but in fact, very few are made. This is mainly because under low reaction intensity, large atoms will only split neutrons, and the normal impact is very small."

"Unless under certain circumstances, the reaction will not proceed fully, but will produce a lot of substances. Hydrogen is the main component, and helium will also appear. Because it is a high temperature environment, many complex chemicals will also appear."

"Look at the smoke produced during the reaction. There are a lot of toxic gases in it. Especially when the reaction is contaminated with high-molecular materials such as plastics, more gases will be produced."

"We have not yet conducted in-depth, analytical research on this technology. Making gold... maybe it will be possible in the future."

Zhang Shuo said this with some anticipation.

'Nuclear fission' involves changes in the nucleus.

If you want to do in-depth research, there are many possible research directions, and from the beginning to now, the research has been regarded as weapons technology and energy technology.

The former is the ion cannon.

The latter is led by Wu Xiaodong to research energy technology.

"Perhaps we can ask Wu Xiaodong's team to do more research on what substances will be produced when a single element is used as a reactant in a constant vacuum environment..."

These require very precise experiments because high temperatures will be generated in the process and the reaction needs to be stably controlled, so the experimental requirements are naturally very high.

After talking about the nuclear force splitting technology, several teachers also showed their concern for the research done by Zhang Shuo.

Zhang Shuo described it in a few words: "Nuclear fusion power generation."

"Nuclear fusion power generation? Isn't it just controlled nuclear fusion technology? The research content of the artificial sun project?" Teacher Wang was a little surprised.

"No."

Zhang Shuo immediately shook his head in denial, "Controlled nuclear fusion is just a process, not a result. In fact, I hope to develop a technology that uses nuclear fusion to support direct power generation."

"Tell me more about it."

"I am studying the relationship between electromagnetic force and strong force. During nuclear fusion, there is a continuous 'strong force field'. It would be inaccurate to say that it can be described as a strong force environment."

"According to my theory, strong force can be converted into electromagnetic force. Therefore, when stable nuclear fusion reaches a constant value, electromagnetic force, or electricity, can be directly generated."

Several teachers, including Tong Zhiguo, were a little confused after listening to this.

It’s not that I can’t understand it, but the content is really bizarre.

Nuclear fusion, direct power generation?

The ultimate goal of the artificial sun project is to stably control nuclear fusion and then generate electricity in a nuclear fusion reactor. If the technology is not improved, we still have to rely on boiling water to generate electricity.

It is really bizarre to generate electricity directly through nuclear fusion.

Professor Wang raised a key question, "So the basis of this research is stable control of nuclear fusion, right?"

"Correct."

Zhang Shuo nodded.

"This condition is difficult to achieve, right?" Teacher Zhao interjected.

Teacher Li suddenly laughed and said, "I know this. It was said by the Institute of Nuclear Physics that Professor Zhang Shuo modified the nuclear fusion device of the Institute of Nuclear Physics, which greatly improved the performance of the device."

"It seems that the interior has been modified. The artificial sun project hopes to introduce this technology. It is said that it will enable their device to reach the most advanced international level."

"With this improvement, the time to achieve controlled nuclear fusion can be greatly shortened."

“This is also a big breakthrough!”

After Teacher Li finished speaking, he looked at Zhang Shuo with admiration. Zhang Shuo's reaction was somewhat unexpected. He shook his head and said, "This has nothing to do with my research."

"what?"

Several people looked over.

Zhang Shuo continued to shake his head and said, "Actually, there is no way to do that research. The equipment of the Institute of Nuclear Physics is too poor. It can't even achieve stable control for ten seconds. And my research needs to use their equipment to measure the strong value." "So, I studied the structure of the tokamak device a little bit and improved the performance of their device."

“This has nothing to do with my research itself.”

Several teachers listened carefully and suddenly felt something strange.

Tong Zhiguo asked blankly, "Professor Zhang Shuo, what did you just say?"

"This has nothing to do with my research?" Zhang Shuo repeated doubtfully.

"Not this sentence, the previous sentence."

"Given some performance improvements to their devices?"

"One more sentence!"

"I just studied the internal structure of the device..."

"Yes, that's it!" Tong Zhiguo said with a smile, "So, you just did a little research and it greatly improved the time it takes for the Tokamak device to stably control nuclear fusion?"

"This technology, which has only been studied for a short time, is regarded as a treasure by the artificial sun project team and can make their equipment reach the most advanced international level?"

"Uh~~~"

The three teachers finally figured out what was strange.

Tong Zhiguo also knew about it.

He looked at Zhang Shuo's complicated expression and found that Zhang Shuo was still confused. He sighed and covered his chest with his hands, holding back a word, "Okay, you..."

"continue!"

……

The second satellite test launch did not happen overnight.

This time the luck was not as good as last time. The ion cannon had to fire six times before it finally succeeded in hitting the target. The interval between the last time and the last time was 27 hours.

The second test launch was very important because the military satellite had tracked the target and captured clear footage of the strike process at close range.

The satellite even captured the impact process, that is, the ion cluster. From the perspective of the camera lens, the ion cluster is a small, blurry dot. In regular photos and videos, it cannot be seen at all if you don’t pay attention. Even if you notice it, you will just think it is a problem with the lens.

However, a thermal imaging lens can reveal that the blurry dots are in a high temperature state.

This time the test shot hit the center of the satellite debris, and a large amount of thick smoke was also emitted, which was almost the same as the psychological performance last time, and it also showed that the reaction was indeed very imperfect.

The tracking satellite not only transmitted photos, but also a video of the strike process. After slowing down the footage, the entire process can be seen clearly.

At the same time, another tracking satellite received the same information.

In the monitoring room of the Information Management Bureau of the Space Information Center, many people stood in front of the screen, watching the images sent from the satellite.

The hot ion clusters captured by the thermal camera were also included in the picture.

When the entire crackdown process is played in the form of a video, you can get the exact information at a glance.

"So that's it."

"It was indeed an external attack. It seems to be an ion cluster, or a high-temperature particle cluster?"

"In short, it is a mass of high-temperature reactive matter, but why does it produce such a great destructive force? If it is just mass and speed, it is impossible..."

Josh Abbott looked puzzled.

Bob and others also didn't understand. "According to the intensity of the heat in the picture, the physical impact is very small, and the target satellite did not cause any direct orbital changes due to the physical impact."

"If it was the effect of high temperature, such a small amount of smoke would not have any effect in space, right? Where did the smoke come from? How did the satellite become debris?"

"What on earth is going on!"

When there were no discoveries, they had all kinds of speculations, but when there were real discoveries, they had even more questions.

The satellite was hit by a small ball of high-temperature matter, but the physical impact was very small, while the power caused was very great, directly turning the satellite into a large mass of debris, and even the solar panels became empty shells.

"What the hell happened!"

Josh Abbott finds that the so-called 'new anti-satellite weapons' are not important.

It was important to explain what happened after the satellite was hit, but the Information Administration had no chemists or physicists, and they had no explanation for what they saw.

In the end, Josh Abbott had no choice but to submit the information.

One video is enough.

After submitting the intelligence information, Josh Abbott suddenly felt reluctant when he thought about being fired.

In this position, one can discover things that ordinary people don’t understand. The video footage captured by satellites are phenomena that cannot be explained.

"This could be alien technology," Josh Abbott said to Bob. "I can't imagine why this could happen, and maybe the experts can't explain it either?"

“Although I’m not an expert, I am a graduate of Stanford University’s information science program.”

Bob shook his head. He stood up and patted Abbott on the shoulder. "Maybe it's a complicated chemical reaction, Josh. Don't worry about it. You're leaving soon anyway."

He was about to walk away when he suddenly stopped and asked, "By the way, when are you leaving?"

Josh Abbott stared at Bob and said with a dark face, "Do you really want me to leave? I still think you are a good friend. I regret recommending you."

"Ha ha……"

Bob smiled and said, "Don't worry about it. You will leave eventually. When you can't find a job, maybe I can recruit you to continue working."

Josh Abbott said bitterly, "Even if I become a homeless person, I will not work for you!"

……

The decision-makers of the United States received the video submitted by the Information Administration.

Everyone who has watched the video felt the same as Josh Abbott, Bob and others, and felt it was incredible.

What exactly is that mass of high-heat energy matter?
Why would such a violent reaction occur after hitting a satellite?
They don't understand.

The only thing that is certain is that the satellite was indeed affected by external factors and caused the thick smoke to come out. The same situation should have occurred with the missile in space last time.

In other words, the flower growers are indeed experimenting with a new type of anti-missile weapon.

The technical principle adopted by this new type of anti-missile weapon is completely different from that of conventional anti-missile weapons. It launches a ball of high-temperature energy to attack the target.

The attack distance is long, the speed is extremely fast, and the power is also great...

But it seems that none of it matters anymore.

The most important thing now is to understand what the high-temperature energy group is.

This thing is horrible!

(End of this chapter)