From an exploratory physics perspective, the early papers from Gennady A. Mesyats are fascinating. Good details on electrode materials and geometry, electrical parameters, explosion event.
If only he had looked at the energy balance or considered the structure could catalyze a nuclear process...
DOI 10.1109/TEI.1983.298603
DOI 10.1016/0022-3115(84)90423-9
DOI 10.1109/DEIV.1996.545457
early papers from Gennady A. Mesyats are fascinating
There are a lot of papers and other articles, jointly authored by Gennady Mesyats, available on ResearchGate.
There are a lot of papers and other articles, jointly authored by Gennady Mesyats, available on ResearchGate.
There is plenty to read and process. The whole journey "only" took Egely about 40 years. For myself, I barely scratched the surface, but even so I have >0.5GB of files already pulled, dozens of publications, patents and books, >10k pages . I'd be nice if someone, or something (i.e. ChatGPT) could pop out a summary. What we could do is to split the task and provide each other with the summary, but how many of "we" might be there?
There is plenty to read and process.
And, unfortunately, although it is all fascinating, a lot of it will turn out to be a distraction. The problem is that it is often impossible to know, beforehand, which paths are going to lead to the desired destination.
It could be very frustrating for someone who is trying to learn how a pigeon is able to fly, to suddenly realise that all those years spent studying the shape and consistency of pigeon droppings have not really helped. 
Scheiße says scorch. Scat's all volks.
Jaitner mentions these conditions for formation of condensed plasmoids:
In order to a z-pinched plasmoid to condense, several conditions are instrumental:
• The current pulse should be very short, i.e. less than a microsecond in duration.
• The current needs to be strong enough, i.e. more than hundred amps.
• The plasmoid should be cooled, i.e. by running the discharge along a dielectric surface or under water.
• Dense matter should be available, which can rapidly feed the forming plasmoid. Typically either the cathode, or
the surrounding gas or the dielectric surface will supply the matter that forms the plasmoid.
• A magnetic field in parallel to the electric field will steer the electrons in the right direction
As far as I understand there is no dielectric surface in Egely's device. Ken Shoulders' texts show diagrams where there is that component also.
And where is the magnetic field in Egely's device ? The discharge current creates of course magnetic field but as far as I understand it's perpendicular instead of parallel to the plasmoid.
And what about strong enough current ? Maybe the current should be proportional to the electrode surface area (diameter of the plasmoid?) instead of an absolute value.
So this text gives some qualitative help but actual quantitative values needed in practice for each of those points seem to require a lot of experiments.
Display MoreYou're spot on!
These thoughts troubled me as well, here's how I explained it to myself:
"As far as I understand there is no dielectric surface in Egely's device." --> There is 0.5bar of H2 gas and/or water vapor. Water has one of the highest dielectric constants out there (asymmetry of molecule).
"Ken Shoulders' texts show diagrams where there is that component also." --> yes, but it's not mandatory for the formation of CPs, it helps fuel the CP?
"And where is the magnetic field in Egely's device ? The discharge current creates of course magnetic field but as far as I understand it's perpendicular instead of parallel to the plasmoid."
--> I think Egely's "deceptively simple looking" device has some tricks up it's sleeve. Here is what I think happens (disclaimer - nobody reviewed it, it might be very very wrong):
1. In the relaxation oscillator circuit you charge up capacitor C1, and inadvertently charge up capacitor C2 - formed by 2 electrodes, distance d and low pressure gas as dielectric. Charges accumulate to electrode tip, electric field E builds up.
This kind of very fast capacitance discharges is also present in Correa devices
Also Stan Meyer's work in the perspective of CPs makes a lot more sense!
Check what I've just found:
It's clearly not electrolysis by current. Look at that rate of production and those gas jets shooting out!
Do you think it has anything to do with condensed plasmoids (either electrically induced or via cavitation), or just high temperature dissociation?
The puzzle is big, however we have some good pieces, pigeon feathers, not all is pigeon droplet.
Never underestimate the power of pigeon droppings. This was reputed to be their effect on MIT's Van de Graff machine in the Round Hill hangar.
As far as I understand there is no dielectric surface in Egely's device. Ken Shoulders' texts show diagrams where there is that component also.
And where is the magnetic field in Egely's device ? The discharge current creates of course magnetic field but as far as I understand it's perpendicular instead of parallel to the plasmoid.
And what about strong enough current ? Maybe the current should be proportional to the electrode surface area (diameter of the plasmoid?) instead of an absolute value.
As Frogfall points out there is dielectric water film/vapour, and the metal electrodes are covered with an oxide layer, also highly dielectric and in this case with high thermal conductuvuty..
As for charge concentration the proximal edges of the electrodes are tapered to a very thin edge which increases charge concentration at that point.
You are quite right about the magnetic field stuff . but over the very short distance between electrodes is may not be required. Shoulders used to make his plasmoids travel much further.
As for source materials to assist with plasmoid fomation, I have asked George to send me some old electrodes for microphotographic examination
As Frogfall points out there is dielectric water film/vapour,
That wasn't me - it was Tibi.fusion 
(I didn't feel it appropriate, yet, to mention the oxide dielectric layer either. Although - yes - I do think it is important.)
See Dielectric Barrier Discharge on wikipedia.
But actually, after looking at some of the Rayleigh "active nitrogen" research, and digging further into the Naudin tests on the Frolov cell, I've since found myself adjusting my perspective somewhat on the Egely device...
I've since found myself adjusting my perspective somewhat on the Egely device...
Do go on.
Do go on.
I'm not sure any of this can be sensibly put into words, yet.
But for many years I've felt like the guy in the Gary Larson cartoon who has Anatidaephobia...
The duck, of course, represents a principle that is absolutely fundamental - and so ridiculously obvious that it has become invisible. So invisible, in fact, that nobody can see it - even though people have been stumbling over its effects for a century.
Unfortunately everyone who hunts for the duck seems to end up like this guy below:
As a good physics course to be able to comprehend the vast documentation out there focused on excess energy (perhaps of which much is pigeon-poo grade), I found the book "PULSED POWER" by Gennady A. Mesyats to be of high value. Attained pdf (30MB) here:
The "explosion" effect is detailed from a physicist's perspective to a level of detail that way surpasses me.
Keywords: explosions, explosive electron emission (EEE), ecton.
Experimental observations, effect characterizations, theory, formulas, all is in there, down to the pressures involved and diameter estimation of the crater created by a cathode microexplosion. All accompanied by a vast reference list. Expect no less from the caliber of the author (you can look up his bio).
One would need insight into effect of dielectric layers? No problem! Liquid dielectrics or solid dielectrics? There is also a whole chapter on metal-dielectric cathode designs. How about liquid metal cathodes, that Ken Shoulders recommends? Considerations are included.
The one thing that seems to be missing is the investigation into energy balance and operation in high pressure hydrogen gas. Anyway I find this book to provide clear insight into physics foundations, hopefully it won't blind me.
Could you upload 'Pulsed Power' into our library please
There is a more compact 8mb version available too.
Intriguing paper: Brightness distribution and current density of vacuum arc cathode spots
QuoteRegions of the cathode spot plasma emitting different radiation.
1. optically thick, non-ideal plasma. Its ‘surface’ emits black body radiation;
2. plasma emitting predominantly free-free continuum;
3. plasma emitting predominantly free-bound continuum;
4. plasma emitting predominantly line radiation;
5. plasma in excitation non-equilibrium, only marginal radiation
The authors used various ways to record the light coming from the region around a cathode spot. The central “core” (1) tended to be close to the surface, and only a couple of microns across.
QuoteThe ‘surface’ of the optically thick plasma core emits black-body radiation with T ~ 5 eV.
5 eV converts to around 58,000 K (the tests were done with copper cathodes)
Although that is instantaneous electron temperature, and doesn’t equate to a heat output.
From my own ballistics work, I would say that typical “cathode spot” profiles do resemble craters produced by explosions at a surface, rather than impact craters.
I posted a link to my gdrive as file was too large to upload to lenr-forum directly.
See useful book thread.
5 eV converts to around 58,000 K (the tests were done with copper cathodes)
It would have been interesting to monitor monochromatic lines corresponding to heavier fusion products. Production of helium and heavier elements apparently is common despite the fact little to no effort is generally spent on identifying root-cause.
Between some of the first publications I've read (sorry I discarded them all, but I remember starting from Egely's long video, timestamp 15:25 "The Production o f Neon and Helium by the Electrical Discharge" By J. Norman Collie, F.E.S., Hubert S. Patterson, and Irvine Masson then going through references looking up subsequent follow-up work) was a series of investigations on alleged adsorbed and absorbed neon by electrode metal at foundry/production stage/whatever early stage, and no amount of vacuuming with heating, boiling, evaporating the metal managed to release the gas, only ark discharge. Go figure. I recall authors concluding to unknown effects for those poor neon atoms hanging on to the metal . I imagine love was the force, or something divine, and only zapping them with high voltage managed to break the bond. The so obvious - obvious at a level where it is already invisible - "duck" effect of possibly PRODUCING neon was I guess excluded on the basis it's not even remotely possible. It is forbidden to think about. It's like the statement on Jaitner's webpage "Physicist Neils Bohr insisted that Langmuir's results could not be correct since they violated conservation of energy and persuaded Langmuir that publishing them would ruin his career".
and no amount of vacuuming with heating, boiling, evaporating the metal managed to release the gas, only ark discharge. Go figure.
This classic from JJ Thomson is one of my favourites: https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/1636856.pdf
