At this moment, having truly mastered the Grand Unified Theory and propelled his own technological level to a Strong Nuclear Civilization, Li Qingsong finally understood just how powerful a Strong Nuclear Civilization was compared to an Electroweak Civilization.
Although Li Qingsong hadn't truly mastered any of the application technologies of a Strong Nuclear Civilization yet, it didn't stop him from developing prospects based on his existing foundation.
First was the energy aspect.
Electroweak Civilizations, like Li Qingsong before and now, primarily derived energy from deuterium-tritium fusion.
The energy conversion efficiency of deuterium-tritium fusion is about , while proton-proton fusion, that is, the proton chain fusion involving only ordinary hydrogen, has an energy conversion efficiency of up to , almost twice that of deuterium-tritium fusion!
At the same time, combining proton chain fusion and deuterium-helium-3 fusion can further increase the energy conversion efficiency to over 1%, three times that of deuterium-tritium fusion!
Think about it, carrying the same mass of fuel but being able to release three times the original energy, what does this mean for a spaceship or a fleet?
Of course, changing from deuterium-tritium fusion to proton chain + deuterium-helium-3 fusion mode is extremely difficult.
Because proton chain fusion requires extremely high temperatures and pressures. Even the core of the sun, or a massive star like Pegasus V432, cannot meet the requirements.
Of course, the type of fusion occurring in the core of a star like the sun is indeed proton chain fusion, but this does not prevent the reality that its interior does not actually meet the requirements for proton chain fusion.
This seems somewhat contradictory. Why can proton chain fusion occur even if the requirements are not met?
This is due to quantum tunneling.
With an extremely low probability, a proton inside a hydrogen atom may directly tunnel next to a proton inside another hydrogen atom, and the two protons combine, resulting in proton chain fusion.
That is, it does not begin to combine because it has sufficient temperature and pressure, but is entirely based on the probability of quantum tunneling to combine and undergo fusion.
So, is the probability of quantum tunneling occurring, leading to proton chain fusion, high?
The answer is not high at all; on the contrary, it is very, very low, even less than one in a hundred million.
Then why can a star like the sun still maintain such a high rate of fusion?
The answer is simple: it is too big, with too many protons inside. Even if the probability is low, there will always be a large number of protons "tunneling" to other protons for no reason and undergoing fusion.
From this perspective, stars should not exist according to conventional theories, but the magic of quantum mechanics allows them to exist.
This shows the difficulty of performing proton-proton chain fusion.
Even the core of such a massive star cannot reach the corresponding temperature and pressure, so how can intelligent life do it?
The answer is also simple.
After mastering the Grand Unified Theory, intelligent civilizations can influence the strong nuclear force to change the strength of various forces within the atomic nucleus, thereby reducing the difficulty of proton chain fusion and making controlled proton chain fusion a reality.
At the same time, the main product of conventional proton chain fusion is neutrinos, with over 90% of the energy being carried away by neutrinos, making it unusable.
Similarly, after mastering the Grand Unified Theory, Li Qingsong also had the confidence to find a way to change the fusion mode of particles, reduce the number of neutrinos in its products, and utilize more of its energy.
Although Li Qingsong couldn't do any of this right now, the Grand Unified Theory had already solved the theoretical obstacles and indicated the direction of future engineering implementation.
In addition to the huge improvement in energy supply, Li Qingsong also saw the future direction in ion thrusters.
Also through the influence and manipulation of the strong nuclear force, Li Qingsong would be able to create electromagnetic acceleration devices completely different from the previous principles, increasing the speed of ions ejected by the ion thrusters by dozens or hundreds of times.
And the reverse thrust generated per unit of propellant is directly related to its ejection speed.
The faster the propellant is ejected, the greater the reverse thrust it generates. That is, the higher the utilization efficiency.
The change in fusion mode brought a huge improvement in energy supply, reaching about three times the previous level.
The increase in propellant ejection speed brought a huge improvement in propellant utilization efficiency, even reaching dozens of times the previous level.
What do the combination of the two mean?
Obviously, higher speed!
Li Qingsong was certain that this was the reason why the Mechanoid Scourge fleet could achieve such high speeds.
And, the mastery of the Grand Unified Theory also allowed Li Qingsong to truly understand the principle behind the Mechanoid Scourge fleet's miraculous energy shields, which almost crushed him.
This was also based on the manipulation of the strong nuclear force!
Through some special equipment—Li Qingsong didn't know the working principle of this equipment yet, but the Grand Unified Theory also predicted the existence of this equipment—Strong Nuclear civilizations could change the state of matter into a thin layer of gluon plasma and then cover it on the surface of the spaceship.
The different particles of this layer of gluon plasma are connected to each other by the strong nuclear force, and its strength is higher than the most durable special fiber that Li Qingsong can manufacture, such as the material used for space elevators.
This is equivalent to putting a super-strong bulletproof vest on the spaceship or other facilities.
The best part is that this layer of gluon plasma, controlled by a magnetic field, can be easily and sensitively manipulated.
It can be seamless and perfect, or it can easily open a hole to allow its own projectiles or other weapons to pass through.
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When needed, it can wrap the entire spaceship in a very short time. When not needed, it can also completely dissipate in an instant.
In addition to this, Li Qingsong also found another possibility predicted by the Grand Unified Theory.
Of course, energy cannons are based on a more advanced mechanism, firing projectiles at a faster speed.
At the same time, it also has another most important improvement.
That is, Strong Nuclear civilizations can also influence the strong nuclear force to put its projectiles in a certain "strong nuclear excited state" and keep it stable.
The fundamental reason why atomic bombs and hydrogen bombs are called nuclear weapons is that their energy comes from the release of the strong nuclear force inside elementary particles.
And the projectiles of energy cannons, after being placed in a strong nuclear excited state, can also release a small portion of the huge energy contained in the strong nuclear force.
From this point of view, the projectiles released by energy cannons in a strong nuclear excited state are not projectiles in essence, but can be regarded as ultra-miniature, less efficient nuclear bombs!
But no matter how small or inefficient they are, they are still nuclear bombs.
On one side are ordinary electromagnetic cannon projectiles, which are nothing more than faster and have higher kinetic energy, but mainly rely on kinetic energy to inflict damage.
And now, the projectiles used by Strong Nuclear civilizations are ultra-miniature nuclear bombs, so how can they fight?
