Research starts with PhD students

Chapter 263 Gold Manufacturing, Turning Stone into Gold!

“Research in new physics directions requires a lot of investment.”

"Just the chaos force field alone requires continuous investment, perhaps tens of billions or even more every year."

"This direction is more complicated than perfecting the standard model of particles, requires higher experimental requirements, and is also dangerous..."

"In order to keep the research going and support more theoretical expansion and scientific and technological research and development, it is necessary to transform the technology into application and realize the realization of technology."

Zhang Shuo said it with certainty.

The teachers present here also understand what I mean. Throughout history, this has been the case with every new technology that has changed human life.

For example, computer technology.

Over the past hundred years, it is computer technology that has brought about earth-shaking changes in human life. The first computers were huge monsters with very low computing efficiency.

It was created at the time to be used by scientific researchers for calculations and information exchange.

If we just focus on research and keep all related technologies confidential, we wouldn't have the current high-end computer technology.

It is precisely because of the investment of a large number of companies, the participation of a large number of scientific and technological personnel, and the real market-oriented operation that computer technology will be popularized throughout the world.

The countries that initially developed computer technology have also benefited from this, now owning many multinational technology companies that have mastered the most advanced technology.

The same is true for research in new physics directions. If we want to achieve more theoretical and technological research and development, we must consider the issue of technological monetization. Otherwise, if we continue to invest without output, our investment will inevitably be directly restricted.

That's the situation now.

Research in the direction of chaos force fields requires too much investment, and coupled with the fact that the research involves great risks, investing in the research becomes a problem.

The chaotic force field is directly related to the theory and technological direction of new physics.

If we cannot continue to expand research, the new physics direction will stagnate. The new physics direction is the capital for China to catch up with the international level and lead the world. If we cannot expand research, the overall development will be restricted.

The research on chaos force fields is unlikely to produce direct scientific and technological outputs, but it is directly related to theoretical research.

It not only conducts theoretical research, but also supports scientific and technological development in new physics directions.

This is a cycle.

Compared with the study of the standard model of particles, the chaotic force field requires higher investment, and funding will be a huge problem.

Such a huge research project cannot be completed with simple support, it must have a steady supply of sufficient funding.

It is obviously impossible to achieve this by relying solely on national science and technology funding.

The teachers present were silent for a moment.

Mr. Wang from the Science and Technology Department said solemnly, "How do you monetize it? Please tell me in detail."

Zhang Shuo thought about it for a while and sorted out his thoughts. "In the new physics direction, there are gravitational technology that is not directly related to military technology, and there may be energy technology in the future."

The teachers present nodded in agreement.

Gravity technology is related to aviation, aerospace, and other scientific and technological fields, but it does not directly involve military technology.

The energy technology that Zhang Shuo mentioned refers to the splitting of atomic nuclei, which is the research of Wu Xiaodong's team.

Once the technology matures, it will indeed be possible to monetize the technology.

First of all, domestically, we can support the manufacturing of several large power stations, but the initial investment is just an investment, and it will take a long time to recover the cost.

Zhang Shuo continued, "Internationally, it is no longer a secret that we have mastered gravity technology."

"There has always been public opinion, and various speculations are close to the truth."

"The problem now is that gravity technology is just a waste of time. It will take a lot of money to continue researching it, but it will not be able to be applied on a large scale."

Everyone agrees with this point.

Gravity manufacturing technology is indeed very advanced, and it can make aircraft take off by creating a gravitational field, but the key is that energy technology cannot keep up.

If energy technology cannot keep up, aircraft will not be able to operate for long periods of time.

Therefore, the research on gravity technology will most likely be suspended, and then filed as confidential technology. Perhaps decades later, when energy technology catches up, aircraft will be manufactured based on it.

Zhang Shuo glanced at the teachers present, paused for a moment and then continued, "We can use gravity technology as a breakthrough in the realization of science and technology."

"For example, manufacturing large-scale gravity equipment for international sales."

"Other countries, institutions and companies can all conduct application expansion research based on gravity equipment."

"Subsequent applications will be more extensive, and the equipment will be sold more."

The application range of gravity technology is too wide. The most direct thing that comes to mind is to create a simulated space weightlessness environment on the ground so that astronauts can receive weightlessness training.

In terms of technological applications, it can also be used to build a safe take-off and landing platform for aircraft.

For example, the gravity equipment itself can provide direct entertainment experience, and ordinary people can also experience the weightless environment.

Industrially speaking, the gravitational field not only creates a weightless environment, but can also be superimposed with the Earth's gravity to create more than twice the Earth's gravity, greatly increasing the performance of some heavy machinery.

and many more.

There are still many application directions for gravitational equipment. Only after it is truly applied can we know where it can be used specifically.

Just by thinking of the directions, you can easily earn back the R&D funds of gravity technology a hundred or a thousand times.

"Professor Zhang Shuo, have you ever considered the issue of technology leakage?" Teacher Li pondered for a moment and asked a key question.

"You mean reverse engineering?"

Zhang Shuo went straight to the point and then said, "In fact, technology is not easy to leak, and reverse engineering is also difficult to achieve."

“I don’t know the specifics of the technical research, but in terms of experiments, even if there are professionals watching the experiments, it is extremely difficult to replicate the experiments if the parameters are not understood.”

“Of course, it can be done with long-term research and a lot of investment, but it requires a lot of investment and a long time.”

"It may take ten, twenty years? Or even more."

"Reverse engineering also requires experimental support. They can only know the internal situation of the equipment, but the more advanced the modern scientific and technological equipment is, the more difficult it is to reverse engineer. Gravitational technology equipment..."

“Maybe it will be possible in ten, twenty years, or even longer?”

Zhang Shuo estimated the time required, "It requires a lot of experiments and a lot of people to participate in the research."

This is the reality.

The more advanced the technology, the more difficult it is to reverse engineer.

There are some technological fields in China that are backward, such as photolithography machines. If there is a photolithography machine in front of us, can we manufacture it by disassembling it?
That is of course impossible.

There are too many technical directions to be solved, and just manufacturing physical components and materials is too far away from realizing manufacturing.

Gravity technology is also very complex and cannot catch up with lithography machines, but because it involves a complex parameter system, it is extremely difficult to reverse engineer the manufactured equipment.

Even if it can be reversed in the future, the country has already mastered more advanced technology due to continuous funding.

After listening to Zhang Shuo’s words, the teachers present began to think and discuss.

They felt that they could indeed discuss the issue with experts. Of course, the most important thing was to study the difficulty of reverse engineering the technology.

If the difficulty of reversing is indeed very high, you can also consider monetizing the technology.

After Zhang Shuo finished talking about the monetization of gravity technology, he suddenly thought of something and asked, "Is there a team researching precious metal manufacturing technology now?" "Precious metal manufacturing?" Several teachers were a little stunned.

Teacher Wang asked, "You mean the precious metal manufacturing company? The mining industry?"

Zhang Shuo immediately shook his head, "Atomic nucleus splitting technology."

"We talked about this at the last meeting. Professor Wu Xiaodong jokingly asked whether gold manufacturing could be achieved. I did not discuss this issue in depth, but in fact, it is possible."

"The splitting of atomic nuclei by nuclear force is very complicated, but Professor Tong Zhiguo's research has supported the development of ion cannons."

"We can use this to control the strength and conduct a series of experiments to see if precious metal manufacturing is possible."

“If precious metals can be produced and the input cost is less than the output, it will also become a key technology and may directly achieve profitability…”

All the teachers present were a little stunned.

If Zhang Shuo hadn't said those words just now, they would definitely have taken it as a joke.

Made of precious metals?
Made of gold?
Relying on the nuclear fission technology to directly produce gold really feels like turning stone into gold.

“Is this technology really feasible?”

Teacher Wang couldn't help but ask directly, and the other teachers also started talking excitedly, "Is it true? Professor Zhang Shuo?"

"Are you kidding me?"

"I feel like this is a little too fake. If we really have this kind of technology, everything will be easy in the future."

A group of people continued to look at Zhang Shuo.

Their reaction was much more enthusiastic than when they heard about the monetization of gravity technology just now.

Gravity technology is a technology that has already been mastered, and we are just discussing how to monetize it.

Made of precious metals?
This is a technology that is unimaginable, and can even be described as magic.

They don’t understand the technical principles, but they can imagine that once it is realized, they will have the means to turn stones into gold.

By then, will funding still be a problem?

Zhang Shuo said, "I can only say that it is possible, but the details still depend on experimental research."

"I didn't dare to say this before, because the nuclear force splitting technology itself is very complicated, but with the ion cannon, we can continue to conduct experiments."

“Personally, I think we can give it a try.”

"How about this, Professor Zhang Shuo, why don't you form a team to do some research? Regardless of whether it succeeds or not, I will give you 100% support!" Teacher Wang's words were without a doubt.

The other teachers also nodded, their eyes shining with enthusiasm.

Made of gold!
Midas touch!

This technology sounds very advanced and even more attractive than gravity technology.

By then, not only will there be no need to worry about research funding, but even gold reserves will not be a problem, because gold can be directly manufactured.

By then, it seems that economics, finance, and the like can be easily solved, and can bring endless benefits.

Zhang Shuo didn't expect that several teachers would push the matter onto him.

He just wanted to ask if there were any relevant research teams. Since the splitting of atomic nuclei by nuclear force can create "new elements", relevant research can be expanded.

Of course, research is not easy.

The study of nuclear force splitting ion cluster reactions requires many complex experiments. It may take several years or even more than ten years for a conventional team to master some technologies.

If it is about manufacturing precious metals, maybe it will take twenty years to research it?

If it were me...

He said he frowned and thought for a long time, and felt that it was worth a try.

With the assistance of system tasks, the speed of technical research will be very fast. Each experiment will accumulate a large amount of basic data, which can be analyzed to greatly speed up the research.

So, how long will it take?

……

In fact, the technology of artificial gold has already been realized.

In the 80s, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory successfully converted bismuth (element 83) into gold (element 79).

Using a high-energy particle accelerator, particles traveling at nearly the speed of light are bombarded against the bismuth nucleus. Under the action of the particles, the four protons of the bismuth element are separated from the nucleus, leaving only 4 protons.

As a result, the structure of the bismuth atom lost its stability, mutated instantly, and became a gold atom.

Seventeen years later, Japanese scientist Takaaki Matsumoto once again created "artificial gold" through nuclear seed transformation technology.

He used high-energy gamma rays to irradiate mercury, causing it to lose a proton and become a new atom.

In the experiment, 1.34 tons of mercury were irradiated with gamma rays for seventy days, and 744 grams of gold were obtained at the end of the experiment.

In addition to the above two experiments, there are other methods to artificially create gold.

But no matter what method is used, there is a same problem:
The cost is too high!

When the manufacturing cost is far higher than the value of the gold produced, gold manufacturing technology can only remain in the laboratory.

Therefore, in order to realize the application of gold manufacturing, the manufacturing cost must be greatly reduced.

Ion cannon bombardment is a very good choice.

"With only electricity and materials consumed, the cost shouldn't be too high, right?"

Zhang Shuo also didn't know the specific situation.

After communicating with teachers in the capital, he went to the ion cannon research and development team.

He found Liu Xu, the head of the R&D team, and asked about the specifics of the ion cannon technology. "How much does it cost to fire an ion cannon now?"

He added, "This includes human, material, and direct power losses, as well as equipment losses."

"Maybe, one hundred thousand?"

Liu Xu was not sure about this, because it was difficult to say how much the device would wear out. He thought about it for a while and continued, "We are already researching mass production, and we expect the cost of a launch to drop to less than 20,000 in the future."

"If we take into account the loss of equipment, manpower, etc., maybe it will reach 40,000?"

"It's hard to say right now. There aren't enough experiments."

Zhang Shuo thought silently for a while and felt that the technical research was feasible.

The cost is very low.

After the ion cannon is fired, the field force it brings is very large, and matter within dozens of meters will be affected.

When bombarding large atomic matter, even if only one ten-thousandth is converted into gold, the value after extraction is far lower than the manufacturing cost.

"Maybe it will work! We can give it a try..."

Zhang Shuo made a decision immediately.

(End of this chapter)