In the 19th century, the world ran on steam. In the 21st century, little has changed. Every thermal power plant still relies on steam as a final stage.
The target chamber at the National Ignition Facility has been the site of a number of breakthroughs in fusion physics.
U.S. Department of Energy/Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
The promise of abundant, clean energy powered by nuclear fusion is one big step closer thanks to a new experiment. The results are a historic scientific milestone, but energy production remains a ways off.
Magnetic fusion reactors contain super hot plasma in a donut-shaped container called a tokamak.
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In January 2022, the JET fusion experiment produced more power over a longer period of time than any past attempt. Two physicists explain the engineering advancements that made the result possible.
It only takes light about eight minutes to go from the Sun to Earth.
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The fastest things ever made by humans are spacecraft, and the fastest spacecraft reached 330,000 mph – only 0.05% the speed of light. But there are ways to go faster.
Fire a set of high-power lasers at a tiny speck of hydrogen isotopes and you can initiate nuclear fusion, the process that powers the Sun.
National Ignition Facility
Scientists are working on ways to make lots of energy by converting matter into energy. The trick is keeping the process under control. One possibility is nuclear fusion – the Sun’s power source.
People long assumed all the elements we see now were created during the Big Bang. But on May 2, 1952, an astronomer reported spotting new elements coming from an old star and changed our origin story.
Planetary Astrophysicist, Senior Research Scientist at the Southwest Research Institute and Co-Investigator for the Nexus for Exoplanet System Science (NExSS), Arizona State University