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A comment on US Department of Energy: Fusion Ignition Achieved. Parent comment

Re:US Department of Energy: Fusion Ignition Achieved by short_sells_poo on Tuesday December 13, 2022 @03:29PM (#33975274)
I'm always fascinated by the sheer and unfathomable amounts of energy that is thrown around in these events. Just thinking about the fact that a single spoonful of neutron star matter contains more mass than Mount Everest fills me with wonder about the world we live in.
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Re:US Department of Energy: Fusion Ignition Achieved by galangalalgol on Tuesday December 13, 2022 @05:06PM (#33976668)
What happens whena tablespoon of neutron soup gets thrown out of the well of a neutron star? Does it suddenly expand to the size of everest? Where do the electrons come from?
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Re:US Department of Energy: Fusion Ignition Achieved by caf on Tuesday December 13, 2022 @06:17PM (#33977688)
In terms of "where do the electrons come from", an ordinary neutron in free space has a half-life of about 10 minutes, decaying through beta decay which produces a proton, an electron and a neutrino.
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Re:US Department of Energy: Fusion Ignition Achieved by galangalalgol on Tuesday December 13, 2022 @06:39PM (#33977906)
That sounds fairly energetic... So after 10min you'd have some odd mix of heavy elements probably approaching a decent fraction of the volume of everest. Half the volume of everest x (densityofgranite / densityoflead)

That kind of expansion rate has to rival any explosion imaginable.

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Re:US Department of Energy: Fusion Ignition Achieved by heavyset_go on Tuesday December 13, 2022 @05:25PM (#33976946)
I'd imagine some of the energy and degenerate matter consisting of neutrons would convert to protons and electrons, and nucleosynthesis would take place to form elements.

I have no idea, though, but I'm pretty sure I watched a video about this.

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Re:US Department of Energy: Fusion Ignition Achieved by ajross on Tuesday December 13, 2022 @09:02PM (#33979114)
It's essentially a giant atomic nucleus, so absent a star's worth of gravity holding it together it's going to decay rapidly into stable isotopes. So essentially it would act more or less the same as a huge fission bomb of the same mass.
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