Reply To: A new way of generating electricity

[jamesr]

Brian H wrote:
So the temp ref in the article is wrong? Interesting.

In the core of a star there are so many photons that cause the radiation pressure that normally balances the gravitational compression. It would only take a slight imbalance of a few of the highest energy photons being used up to form electron/positron pairs to start a cascade. Once the gravitational collapse starts, enormous amounts of potential energy are converted to kinetic. Heating the layer of the star in the process, and so implosion turns to explosion. Depending on the size of the star this could just eject the outer layers or if the collapse proceeds further triggering fusion of heavier elements and you have a huge supernovae.

See: wikipedia – Pair instability supernova