ON THE BEHAVIOR OF THE PD D SYSTEM - EVIDENCE FOR TRITIUM PRODUCTION/

Evidence for tritium production in the Pd/D system under cathodic pola rization is presented. A comparison of the observed distribution and t hat calculated, based on the conservation of mass, leads to the conclu sion that tritium is produced sporadically at an estimated rate of sim ilar to 10(3) to 10(4) atom/s. The results of several runs are interpr eted by employing the concept of an electrode/electrolyte interphase a nd the accepted kinetics of hydrogen evolution. Burstlike events follo wed by longer periods of inactivity yield poor reproducibility when di stributions are averaged over the total time of electrolysis.