Latest news with #AdamRutkowski
NDTV
8 hours ago
- Business
- NDTV
US Startup Claims To Have Found New Way To Make 5,000-Kg Of Gold Every Year
A US startup has claimed that it has found a novel way to turn mercury into gold, opening a new 'revenue stream for the future'. San Francisco-based Marathon Fusion stated that using the nuclear fusion process, the precious element can be developed. Using the radioactivity from neutron particles in a nuclear fusion reactor, the team from Marathon Fusion said mercury can be converted into mercury-197. Afterwards, this element decays into a stable form of gold: gold-197. "Fusion-driven transmutation of mercury into gold transforms fusion energy from a stand-alone power technology into a multi-product industrial platform, dramatically strengthening its economic and societal value proposition," the company highlighted in a yet-to-be-peer-reviewed paper. As per the estimates by the researchers, a fusion power plant could produce 5,000 kg of gold per gigawatt of thermal power in a single year of operation. Since one gigawatt is the average output of a large nuclear plant, it could lead to over $550 million worth of gold per year per GW of fusion energy. "With focused effort on the technology gaps identified, the approach described could accelerate the commercial deployment of fusion power and, in doing so, turn an ancient aspiration into a reality. The goal of classical alchemy is now achievable through practical engineered solutions." The researchers said the gold was the bonus byproduct of the fusion reactors, and it would not interfere with the plant's primary purpose of developing clean energy. However, one complication is that the presence of other types of mercury may result in the production of unstable gold isotopes alongside gold-197, meaning the metal could be partially radioactive. Marathon Fusion's chief technology officer, Adam Rutkowski told Financial Times that the gold would have to be stored for 14 to 18 years for it to be labelled radiation-safe. Gold from mercury -- dream or pipe dream? Scientists regard nuclear fusion as the holy grail of energy that could help in generating limitless, clean energy for the planet. It is what powers our Sun as atomic nuclei are merged to create massive amounts of energy, which is the opposite of the fission process used in atomic weapons and nuclear power plants, where the heavy atom is split into multiple smaller ones. In the last few years, Marathon Fusion has raised almost $6 million in investments and $4 million in government grants, as it focuses on developing efficient nuclear fusion power systems. However, until commercial fusion reactors are developed, the dream of making gold from mercury may remain a pipe dream.
India Today
2 days ago
- Business
- India Today
Silicon Valley startup says it has found way to turn mercury into gold, if proven may hit gold prices
A fusion energy startup claims to have found a way to turn mercury into gold. According to the Financial Times report, San Francisco-based Marathon Fusion says that the same process that could one day represent a limitless source of clean energy could also be used for literal alchemy. As detailed in a yet-to-be-peer-reviewed paper, nuclear transmutation, effectively changing an element or isotope into a different one by ripping out protons from its nucleus, could be used to synthesise gold particles. "On paper, it looks great and everyone so far that I talk to remains intrigued and excited," Department of Energy plasma physicist Ahmed Diallo, who reviewed the study, told the Financial the last three years, Marathon Fusion has raised almost $6 million in investments and $4 million in government grants, focusing its efforts on making fusion power systems more the concept of replicating the conditions in the Sun's core to produce a net positive amount of energy has remained extremely elusive, despite decades of research. Scientists are only beginning to crack the point at which fusion plants generate more energy than they require to operate. Scaling up these operations is proving just as difficult, with scientists struggling to contain extremely high-energy and unpredictable plasma inside enormously complex reactors. Earlier this year, Marathon turned its attention to nuclear transmutation, proposing to introduce a mercury isotope, mercury-198, into a fusion reactor to turn it into mercury-197. That's in addition to the conventional fuels used to realise fusion inside a reactor, such as lithium and hydrogen this time, there's an interesting side effect: mercury-197 is an unstable isotope that eventually decays into the process remains unproven, the startup's leadership is seeing dollar signs — or gold ingots, as the case may be. CTO Adam Rutkowski and CEO Kyle Schiller say they could produce 11,000 pounds of gold a year per gigawatt of electricity generation, and without affecting the overall power output of the claims its breakthrough technique could allow fusion reactors to produce gold as a bonus byproduct, without reducing the plant's energy output or compromising its ability to sustain its own fuel cycle. According to the company's projections, a fusion power station with a capacity of one gigawatt could generate around 5,000 kilograms of gold every year using this firm notes that while the gold created through this transmutation process would be stable, trace amounts of radioactive isotopes could still be present. This might mean the gold would need to be stored securely for as long as 18 years before it could be handled or sold techno-economic modelling suggests that such a setup could make gold production just as valuable as the electricity the plant generates, effectively doubling the commercial potential of a fusion facility and dramatically reshaping the economic case for fusion gold, the company adds that the same nuclear processes could also be used to create other high-value materials, such as components for 'nuclear batteries,' medical isotopes for healthcare, and precious metals like a result, the hypothetical fusion power plant could theoretically double its revenue, they also suggested that the key insight here is that it can be used in a set of fast neutron reactions to make really large quantities of gold while satisfying the fuel cycle requirements of the system. Of course, it's not quite as simple as that. For one, other gold isotopes created in the process could make the valuable metal radioactive, which could mean it would have to be stored for anywhere from 14 to 18 years before it's safe to with a massive surge in new startups attracting billions of dollars in investments to turn fusion reactors into a viable form of energy production, the basic concept of fusing atoms to generate electricity has yet to become practical.- EndsTrending Reel
Gizmodo
4 days ago
- Business
- Gizmodo
Startup Claims Its Fusion Reactor Concept Can Turn Cheap Mercury Into Gold
Keep checking those gold prices—scientists have more news about the coveted metal. An energy startup claims it has the recipe for modern-day alchemy: turning mercury into gold inside a nuclear fusion reactor. Last week, Marathon Fusion, a San Francisco-based energy startup, submitted a preprint detailing an action plan for synthesizing gold particles via nuclear transmutation—essentially the process of turning one element into another by tweaking its nucleus. The paper, which has yet to undergo peer review, argues that the proposed system would offer a new revenue stream from all the new gold being produced, in addition to other economic and technological benefits. Specifically, the proposed method involves introducing mercury-198 into a fusion reactor and bombarding it with neutrons until it transforms into mercury-197, a much more unstable isotope of mercury. Because of its instability, mercury-197 decays into gold-197, the only stable isotope of gold. This process takes about 64 hours and relies on the steady release of high-energy neutrons popping out of the fusion of the hydrogen isotopes deuterium and tritium. A special 'blanket configuration' in the tokamak—a donut-shaped machine that uses magnetic fields to confine plasma—would separate gold production from the fusion plant's energy generation, according to the study authors. As a result, gold production wouldn't impinge on the plant's primary function to generate nuclear energy. This setup would allow the plant to 'simultaneously meet the fuel cycle requirements of [deuterium and tritium] fusion and achieve economically valuable production of gold,' the authors wrote in the paper. Assuming this is all feasible—and this remains a big theoretical assumption—reactors using this approach could produce around 11,000 pounds (5,000 kilograms) of gold every year per gigawatt of electricity generated, according to Marathon Fusion's chief executive, Kyle Schiller, and chief technology officer, Adam Rutkowski. To put this into perspective, around 3,000 metric tons of gold are mined each year. In an interview with the Financial Times, the two representatives stated that this 'byproduct' could double the revenue of the plant. But it's worth noting that the same process would likely result in the production of unstable and potentially radioactive isotopes of gold. As such, Rutkowski admitted, the gold would have to be stored for 14 to 18 years before it could be labeled radiation-safe. Experts who have (unofficially) reviewed the study claim the proposal presents thought-provoking points that warrant further discussion. 'On paper it looks great, and everyone so far that I talk to remains intrigued and excited,' Ahmed Diallo, a plasma physicist at the U.S. Department of Energy's national laboratory at Princeton who wasn't involved in the study, told the Financial Times. But all that shines is not gold—especially given the fact that, again, the paper has yet to be peer reviewed and does not offer any empirical demonstrations of the proposed setup. If this company is successful, however, perhaps we'll finally have achieved modern alchemy without giant particle accelerators. Although, in my opinion, effectively achieving alchemy through the use of giant accelerators is still pretty cool.
