Generator for Large Fluxes of Kaons and Pions Using Laser-Induced Nuclear Processes in Ultra-Dense Hydrogen H(0)

Laser-induced nuclear reactions in ultra-dense hydrogen H(0) produce mesons with both relatively low kinetic energy and with high kinetic energy. The kaons have up to 100 MeV of kinetic energy, thus a velocity of 0.55 c. Each laser pulse of >0.1 J of energy and length of 5 ns produces 1013 mesons. The operation of the meson generator is here demonstrated by measuring all decay times for mesons in the ns range after induction by a pulsed laser. These decay times are the unique fingerprints of the mesons, and they also produce the kinetic energy of the mesons created from their time-dilated decay. The charged pion decay time at rest from this generator is measured to be 25.92 ± 0.04 ns (standard fit error), in reasonable agreement with the tabulated results of 26.033 ns. A similar accuracy is found for the other mesons as for the charged kaons, with 96 MeV of kinetic energy, at 14.81 ± 0.05 ns. The same general behaviour is found with both deuterium and normal hydrogen forming the ultra-dense phase H(0) on the laser target. This meson generator gives intense meson showers useful for many types of particle physics experiments at a small fraction of the cost of using particle accelerators. A particle accelerator would need an energy of at least 1021 eV to produce a similar shower of 1013 mesons. Thus, the described generator is among the most intense meson sources that exist. Other important applications include nuclear energy generation and particle (pion) radiation for cancer treatment.