Damon Hill writes:

(Henry Spencer) wrote in
:

In article
, Asherian
wrote:
Does anybody know whether Project Prometheus is going to
use a turbine-driven generator or an MHD?

Nobody's made any decisions at that level of detail. It
might well do something like thermionic conversion.

How would thermionic conversion work? I keep imagining
a big vacuum tube triode set up as an oscillator...
The cathode being directly heated by the reactor.

No triodes required --- just a diode: The hotter of two electrodes
"boils off" more electrons than the colder electrode, leading to a
potential difference net flow of electrons from the "hot" to the "cold"
electrode. Also, the space between electrodes is not usually a vacuum,
but usually contains an easily ionized alkali metal vapor such as cesium,
to neutralize the space-charge density of the electron flux.


-- Gordon D. Pusch

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