Hi, I’d posed some related questions in another read – I’d asked if lithium metal or lithium hydride could be used for the electrodes instead of beryllium. It’s cheaper than beryllium, and is a well-known electrode material.
Lithium metal has a low melt point of 185C, but lithium hydride has a higher melt point of 692C – the issue is that lithium hydride can lose some of its hydrogen in a vacuum, by undergoing outgassing. But higher pressures, as you were discussing, might mitigate that. Besides, hydrogen is the least problematic impurity possible.
And even if lithium metal has a low melt point, the most that LPP’s machine has ever generated was 0.1 J in a single shot.
Since Focus Fusion is all about a grassroots R&D effort, I think that any would-be imitators out there should try coming up with ways to use Lithium electrodes – either Lithium metal or Lithium Hydride – in a higher pressure environment.
