On the Possibility of Initiating the Proton–Boron Nuclear Fusion Reaction in the Plasma-Focus Device

Abstract

In this paper, the possibilities to perform aneutronic fusion in Plasma Focus (PF) devices have been presented. For this purpose, an idea of doping plasma by means of laser ablation of a solid boron target during discharge in PF-24 was presented. Some estimates have been made, based on the processes occurring during the discharge in the PF system with gas injection using a fast gas valve, indicating that this method allows the generation of hydrogen-boron plasma. The yield of the 11 B(p,a)aa reaction was calculated. The results presented in this paper show that this yield is high enough to register and measure the alpha particles emitted from the plasma column consisting boron and hydrogen. The estimates were made for the parameters characteristic for PF-24.