From Ian McKinley
Laser transmutation certainly has a long way to go (23 August, p 10). It was noted that the 1017 pulses needed to transmute the small sample of iodine-129 into iodine-128 would need the energy of a dedicated power station.
More problematic, however, is the pulse rate of one per hour. Transmutation thus requires over 1013 (10 trillion) years. With a half-life of a mere 16 million years, the iodine-129 would decay completely over a fraction of this time.
Villigen, Switzerland
