Nuclear Fusion in Dense Plasmas: Supernovae to Ultrahigh-Pressure Liquid Metals

Abstract

This review begins with classifying nuclear reactions in three elements: binary processes, few-particle processes, and many-particle processes, and thereby elucidates the special features for the nuclear fusion in dense plasmas. These analyses are then applied to estimation of the nuclear reaction rates in specific examples of the dense plasmas, namely, ¹²C-¹²C reactions in a white-dwarf progenitor of supernova, p-p reactions in the solar interior, d-d reactions in palladium hydride, and p-d or p-⁷Li reactions in pressurized liquid metals. The special role that the many-particle processes play in dense plasmas is remarked and the similarilty between nuclear reactions in supernovae and those projected in the ultrahigh-pressure liquid metals is particularly emphasized.