Re: Nuclear Isomer Decay: A Possibility for Breakthrough Space

[Hulltmsr@aol.com]

In a message dated 99-04-03 03:00:24 EST, you write:

<< My original point is that like energy, momentum can be nether created nor
 destroyed, just transferred and partitioned. So if electrons leave the
 surface with momentum, then the photons striking the surface had to have
 initial momentum.........  I think !!!
  
 Tom Harrison
 Physics Dept
 University of North Texas
  >>

I only have a Theology degree and many years of nuclear/radsafety 
training/experience....but I seem to recall for something to have momentum, 
it must have mass, therefore photons, being pure energy have no mass.  
Ejected electrons have momentum due to photon energy converted to kinetic 
energy of the electron.

Another point:  My understanding of gamma, gleaned many years ago from, If 
memory serves correctly, Glasstones Sourcebook on Atomic Energy, is that a 
gamma is a spherical energy release, i.e., energy is released in all 
directions and becomes a gamma ray due to shielding/reflection by surrounding 
media much in the same way a flashlight directs a beam of light 
unidirectionally or an x-ray machine collumnates an energy beam from a 
spherical energy release within the x-ray machine (think of your dental 
X-ray:  a chamber in which the energy is spherically released and shielded on 
all sides except that little conical end with a pinhole for energy to escape 
as a beam/ray.) 

Remember gamma is an electromagnetic wave, a part of the same spectrum as as 
light, and it behaves the same as light but with a greater energy and 
therefore imparts more energy to whatever it strikes and thusly can cause 
more things to happen.  Also, a photon is merely a chopped segment of that 
wave, given its name because to early researchers it appeared to be a packet 
of energy that traveled and interacted similarly to a particle but was 
without mass.

If I am correct then the gamma photons produced exert their energy in all 
directions and if energy release is only permitted through the rear of the 
spacecraft, as is done with solid and liquid propellants, then forward motion 
would be caused by force exerted by the gamma against the forward wall of the 
propellant chamber.

Of course these are only opinions, and all mine.

Thomas M. Hull, 
hulltmsr@aol.com
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