Diamond Turned to Liquid

Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories have managed to turn a diamond sheet into a liquid, by creating pressures more of 10 million atmospheres inside a Z machine.

They used a capsule of BB - sized pellet intended to fuel a nuclear fusion reaction. For 50 years, scientists have been searching to release more energy from fused atoms to create unlimited electrical power for humanity. The seawater fusion reaction in half a bathtub could release as much energy as 40 train cars of coal.

These results also provide physics models in computer simulations for assessing the safety and reliability of the US nuclear weapons stockpile. The problem for the giant machines realizing this and which would use this method is that the outer shell of the pellet must transmit pressure evenly into its interior. Liquid diamond could do that. Diamond under 10.4 million atmospheres provides uneven pressures. Creating uneven pressures is like a hand squeezing a water balloon that allows portions of the balloon to exit through spaces between the fingers.

Only diamond would help smooth out the applied pressure loads and keep the capsule implosion symmetric, and not less hard materials, because "at the pressures we're interested in, everything is compressible," said capsule designer Mark Herrmann, a Sandia researcher.

A quantum-molecular simulation program was very important in pinpointing the pressures at which diamond would begin and finish liquefying. The experiments used shock waves to achieve the high pressure created by hitting the diamond with tiny plates moved using Z machine's huge magnetic fields at about 20 times the speed of a rifle bullet.

Illustration by Michael Vittitow