@Paradigmnoia Regarding the shielding of beta, I suppose we should be careful with materials since I suppose they would introduce bremsstrahlung emissions that might confuse the signal we are looking for.
Would not the mullite tube already be sufficient to block any beta generated inside the device though?
If a shield is used wouldn't boric acid be a good option... Also good for neutrons.
@Paradigmnoia In the plot you provided above there is what looks like a small step and slight change in profile in the peak. Do you know what causes this? Is it just an artifact of removing the background? Or is it a real effect? Do we know the energy rang in keV where it occurs?
Regarding the small cluster around 800 keV I'm wondering if they can be gamma emissions at this energy not normally in the background?
I think there are some gamma emissions for some Cu/Ni isotopes around 1300 keV or so, so I'm wondering if we see a cluster there if that can also be indicating excited states of those element. I suppose it could easily be confused with the Compton edge for K40, if it does occur.
My understanding is the 1460 keV emission is from Gamma emission following electron capture. Not from Beta decay.
Edit: Ahh it think I understoood your point better. I agree with that it looks like the background is not completely removed.
Its strange though as I think they calculated the spectrum quite accurately based on the duration of the sample and took into account thermal variations of the scintillator in the spectra quite well. Doesn't the spectrum 7 also include the background though? I remember there was a plot somewhere with the background removed but I can't remember if it still showed excess bump around the 1300 to 1500 keV? This would be near the low accuracy part of the curve though due to the lower number of counts at these higher energies.So perhaps the noise at these energies looks like a signal.
I do wonder if the real Q value is lower maybe around 1000 keV or something and we are seeing elevated counts at higher energies for some other reason.
Edit 2: Im also clear about the normal K40 spectrum being background. Its curious though that the apparent Q value for the spectrum 7 seems to be close to that for K40, which made me wonder if there is also some in the device which is somehow being stimulated into beta decay. I don't think there is though. I'm still trying to identify other Beta sources that maybe generated in the device that may have a similar Q values in the 1300 to 1400 keV range.
Internal/Inner Bremsstrahlung may also be a possibility as it also generates a very similar curve to that seen in Spectrum 7 but again it still has maximum energies at the associated Q values for Beta emission or electron capture.
Its an interesting puzzle.
Edit 3: Regarding shielding the Scintillator from Beta to ensure we only get Bremsstrahlung from the device. I have seen some setups mentioned in papers where a magnet is included to deflect the beta away from the sensor. This can be difficult to set up but perhaps if a sufficiently energetic temporary source was used during set up it might be possible. Probably we would want to be careful of the effect of the magnet on the device though. Probably paper or wood is better.
@Paradigmnoia Thanks a lot for the link regarding the gamma spectra. I like it a lot its a very good summary of the different features of the gamma spectra resulting from gamma emission and I hadn't seen this particular link before.
It is true the beta emission curve looks like a Landau distribution. I suppose for a Bremsstrahlung radiation spectrum from beta decay we would need to integrate the linear electron beam type spectrum over all the energies and intensities of the beta emission spectrum.
In the case of K40 we would get only a few betas with energy around 1311 keV and much more at the lowered of the spectrum with a peak around 100 or 200 keV with an average around 560 keV, so I would not expect a cluster of X-rays around the 1311 keV value from the beta.
I think this would lead to a curve up towards the lower end similar to what has been seen in spectrum 7. It would be interesting to see if someone with better maths skills than me could derive this kind of integration over beta emission energies and see if the curve followed the same rate of increase and over all profile as seen in particular at lower energies.
There may be some interesting deviations at the lower energy. From the beta decay energy graph we see a maximum intensity in the landau type graph at a certain value after which we see it drop quite rapidly as the energy decreases further. From the beta decay example from wiki that I sent I think for a maximum energy in the 1.3 MeV region we would expect a peak intensity around 100 keV or so. I suppose the effect of this on the bremsstrahlung curve would be for the rate of change of increase in intensity to decrease from below the maximum intensity beta energy downwards. Interestingly in the curve for spectrum 7 it almost seems to continue increasing in rate up to the minimum sensitivity value of the spectrum, but maybe any change in rate is difficult to see as it is already increasing very rapidly with lower energy in this region.
I was also curious about the K40 decay… Its one of the few nuclei that have a ground state Q value for beta decay in the 1.3 to 1.4 MeV region. I'm not sure there was any extra Potassium in the device though?
I suppose a similar change in bremsstrahlung curve profile would occur from thermal electrons with a Boltzmann distribution of energies, but I think in this case we would probably see a different profile than that seen at much lower energies and I would be very surprised if we had thermal electrons with a maximum energy of around 1.3 or 1.4 MeV or so.
@Paradigmnoia@Thomas Clarke I'm also curious what Thomas comes up with regarding any possibility of an electrical problem causing the spectra we see. It is certainly true that we seem to see a broad effect over almost the complete spectrum but increasing very much in the low end. Although it looks like Bremsstrahlung of beta to me I think it is certainly very important to be sure there are no other possibilities causing some kind of systematic deviation to the spectra.
@'Paradigmnoia and @'Thomas Clarke',
thanks for for the graph it is also a good one. I think this one however comes from a beam of electrons with fixed energy 100keV. It is indeed linear which is interesting in this case.
In beta decay it is not so simple. In this case the beta electrons are not all not emitted at the maximum Q energy but over a range of energies peaking at a much lower frequency. As some of the energy is taken by the neutrino.
Here is a typical beta emission curve:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wik…ay#/media/File%3ARaE1.jpg
so the bremsstrahlung in the case of beta emission is depends on the full range of beta particles energies not just the Q Value
perhaps this leads to the more curved shape in the profile.
Thanks Thomas for you quick update and reply apparently we had some overlaps with editing 
for information here is a simple model plot from wiki of the bremsstrahlung curve.
HI Thomas, normally I respect your critical approach, especially when you obviously take time to Analyse some results and data and make good arguments. Even if I do not always agree I respect your approach and find your thought through criticisms interesting. I think your point about TC noise sounds interesting and am quite interested what you find about that. However...
In your above statement you mentioned that the curves characteristics are not bremsstrahlung like and even in fact "have completely the wrong characteristics". I'm quite confused by that as it looks very bremsstrahlung like to me for typical emission of beta say with a Q value around 1400 keV, and fermi and plasma frequencies in the metal below the sensitivity of the device? Could you clarify what you meant by that? Perhaps I misunderstood your point as you seemed quite certain in your statement
Also were there any elements present that would have characteristic X-Ray emissions with in the sensitivity of the Scintillator? I don't think many heavy elements were present. I suppose if tungsten or lead or something is In thedevice it could have characteristic X-rays about 67 keV or 80 keV or so. But I think characteristic X-Rays for nickel and aluminum would be below the sensitivity of the Scintillator could you clarify this for me too as I think you were also quite certain about this too as you said it is "obviously wrong"
More likely their LENR business is much bigger and broader than e-cat alone, they consider all of them together equally and inclusively important, and maybe they do not want to draw particular attention to one particular project in a way that detracts from the others. They are trying maybe to build a larger broader multi functional expert team.
perhaps their business plan is to evaluate more than just e-cat at the end of one year.
Ecco. Good idea Regarding the Clean room/Softwall enclosure.
As a further improvement I suppose filling it with inert gas or dry nitrogen would be out of the question but maybe keeping it under slightly positive pressure or venting it with filtered maybe dry air might help keep the dust from coming in some how.
It might help capture any released gasses and particles from the experiment too. Maybe if Helium is generated and escaping maybe it will collect at the top of the tent and be detectable there. (I understand that Helium can leak even easier than molecular H2). Maybe it would be interesting to make an analysis of any collected helium and hydrogen isotopes too.
(Hopefully the tent does not float away though due to the heat, Hydrogen and helium ;))
Maybe we get different activated particles inside the tent than on the outside too. maybe those inside have to come from reactions with particles generated there.
It may also be a reasonably good additional particle shield to those out side protecting from emissions from the experiment and activated particles in the surrounding environment.
Maybe does not need to be so big, just big enough to enclose the experiment. Not the user as well?
Do we know the kinetic energy of the alpha and beta radiation produced by Radon Progeny?
it could be useful for characterizing any bremsstrahlung produced by them if present.
@axil do you know the attached link and document:
https://www.physik.hu-berlin.de/de/nano/lehre/Gastvorlesung Wien/plasmonics
It seems to touch on some the ideas you discuss about plasmonics. I think it's pretty good summary of the concepts . but may be you have already posted it.
Hi Thomas
Its a good point you make. I would add though that I think Freethinker did not have a Gamma spectrometer or Scintillator but just GMC device so perhaps this was also not sensitive to radiations less that 100 keV or so.
Regarding the radiation in the MFMP source It was quite broad spectrum and Bremsstrahlung like. I suppose it would need to be a charged particle probably Beta emitter and to emit quite strongly to create such a curve. Do you know of any natural sources that could produce this? Even Radon Progeny might produce Beta but i would imagine it would need to be quite a concentrated source? And if so shouldn't we see characteristic Gamma and X-rays too?
The following document is about background radiation and in particular Radon and Thoron Progeny.
http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.529.8305&rep=rep1&type=pdf
Its goes into a fair amount of detail I think. There are some Gamma frequencies mentioned in Figure 1.2a some of which I suppose should be visible?
Interestingly I don't see one mentioned here around 80 keV but I suppose if it ends up with lead in an excited sate gammas of this energy could be generated or are the 80keV emissions characteristic x-rays rather than gamma?
Hi Bob would you be able to load the static version of the graph here with the combination of spectrum 7, 8 and 10 along with the average?
Perhaps I am wrong but with the focus on the 78-80 keV peak here It seems to me that maybe some have not seeing the correct graph?
By the way I noticed that in the Piantelli, Focardi paper linked by Ecco that they used Boron as a neutron shield in the form of Boric acid powder sandwiched between polystyrene. I wonder if thats important to consider for the experiment.
Great analysis by the way.
I wonder if it is language thing?
The Patent mentions that:"At these conditions Neutrons would be freed form the reactants and further recaptured by the atoms emitting the photons with energies between 50 and 100 keV"
a) Is he talking about Nucleon (in particular Neutron) spallation? it seems this would normally require much higher energies than bombardment with 100 keV electrons? And he has already mentioned that he does not believe electron capture occurs. Or perhaps he was already thinking it is due to an accumulated effect, phonon resonance or the Extended Mossbauer effect described by Norman Cook?
b) Or could he actually mean that in these conditions the neutrons in the nuclei are simply excited by some method to higher energy levels and then release the photons during de-excitation?
In either case (a) or (b) could the excitement/de-excitment come from the interactions with the accelerated electrons? Perhaps through absorption of bremsstrahlung x-ray emissions at the specific frequency required for that transition? or directly somehow by some kind of internal conversion?
I would tend to think he means a) however, which is interesting. Is he still thinking in these terms i wonder.
Dear Song Sheng Jiang and colleagues
Now we are in the year of the Fire Monkey! I understand the monkey is intelligent and resourceful so hopefully its a great year for you and your team with new discoveries and breakthroughs with the New Fire
It was fantastic to follow your work last year and see how LENR is reaching across toe world to China. Thank you for sharing your work here.
I would like to say happy new year to you and your colleagues and any others who follow the Chinese new year and lunar calendar out there i'm looking forward to what comes up in the year ahead.
Stephen
Hello Gennadiy,
I recently saw an interesting article about the earths core and recently discovered unexpected consistency in the the earths superchrons (magnetic field reversals) over the last 1.5 billion years:
I'm not sure if it relates in directly to your work but I thought it might interest you.
http://www.spacedaily.com/repo…rises_scientists_999.html
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_…/2016-02/ci-coe020316.php
Best Regards
Stephen
I do think that the occasional skeptic comment keeps us in check from time to time for various reasons and they do remind us not to take things for granted. I do also however get a little frustrated when a good discussion topic its overwhelmed by pro versus skeptic discussions and you can no longer find the interesting information.
Perhaps a good solution is to have a separate, thread dedicated for more general pro versus skeptic discussions on various concepts. This would still capture this important part of the dialogue regarding LENR. Other threads would of course still be open for the occasional on topic Pro or Skeptic point but could concentrate on the factual on topic information.
That said back to topic these Celani wire experiments are fascinating to me. Are there any previous threads on the similar tests from the past it would be interesting to look back at them?
Happy new year to everyone here as well. 2015 was amazing I'm looking forward 2016 even more 
Looks like a great setup with good potential.
Is the Boron Nitride new or has it also been used in previous experiments?
Best of luck with the tests.
Hi Sveinn
I just found this interesting article in Space Daily about an experiment run by some physicists at the University of Maryland.
http://www.spacedaily.com/repo…cle_accelerators_999.html
Jones Beene on the Vortex-l email archive also found the related paper:
http://arxiv.org/pdf/1506.02912.pdf
Could it have some similarities in experiment set up to Holmlids experiment? Perhaps there are some mutually relevant results and lessons learnt here although they are not claiming any fusion as far as i can tell. Perhaps they only need to add the right Catalyst and preparation to see your results.
EDIT: Ahh I just realised its the same paper as already sent by PJS… Apologies to you both for resending. It is interesting though. I wonder if they could do a replication.
Best Regards
Stephen
