Projects that bring us closer to the dream of clean nuclear fusion energy

Ensuring quality funding for projects that advance fusion research is of vital importance to global efforts to solve the climate crisis.

Scientists have sought for decades to produce clean energy through what is known as nuclear fusion

Scientific progress has brought the world closer to abundant nuclear energy without radioactive waste. For decades, scientists have sought to produce clean energy through what is known as nuclear fusion, the process that supplies the sun with energy. If they could be used in nuclear reactors on a commercial scale, they could produce an almost unlimited supply of energy.

According to a report of the newspaper " The Times" ( The of Times ) British that the goal is impressive, but the prospects for success in the development of nuclear fusion reactors are operating far - fetched , or at least seemed so until now.

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Researchers at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory have demonstrated fusion ignition for the first time.

Lawrence Livermore and Nuclear Fusion

Last week, researchers at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California first demonstrated fusion ignition, the point at which a fusion reaction becomes self-sustaining. Scientists have hailed the discovery as the most important breakthrough in nuclear fusion over the past 50 years.

Nuclear fusion is the process that powers stars, forcing atoms to fuse together into larger clumps, releasing large amounts of energy, and is different from nuclear fission used in nuclear power plants, which involves splitting atoms.

Moreover, nuclear fusion is very difficult to achieve on Earth because it requires maintaining temperatures of more than 100 million degrees. This process has aroused interest due to its ability to produce clean energy with minimal environmental impact, and virtually no radioactive waste.

The latest experiment involved focusing a laser beam powered by a factory at the National Ignition Facility the size of 3 football fields, at a target pepper-sized capsule containing deuterium and tritium, which are different forms of hydrogen. The laser beam fused the two atoms to form helium, creating a hot spot the diameter of a human hair, generating more than 10 quadrillion watts of fusion power for 100 trillion milliseconds.

Although the $10 billion experiment - according to the newspaper - released only enough energy to boil a jug, and producing usable energy requires a completely different type of reactor; The significance of the discovery could be huge.

Last May, the Atomic Energy Authority announced that it had succeeded in solving one of the integration challenges (UK Atomic Energy Authority).

Clean energy dream

During the experiment, about two-thirds of the energy provided by lasers was released in nuclear fusion, but achieving the equation will make the dream of clean, almost unlimited, energy a reality; This will help countries around the world reduce their dependence on fossil fuels and achieve net zero emissions. This research relied on other scientific developments in the field of nuclear fusion, which increased the possibility of achieving this promising form of clean energy.

Last May, the UK's Atomic Energy Authority announced that it had succeeded in solving one of the biggest integration challenges; It is waste plasma heat dissipation, which would theoretically allow for smaller and more efficient nuclear devices, and more scientific discoveries are expected on the horizon.

Last August, DeepMind, which designed an artificial intelligence system that was able to create a database of proteins, announced its focus on solving problems related to nuclear fusion. At the Culham Centre, British scientists working on the Mast Upgrade project are trying to make reactors commercially viable, thus making clean energy accessible to all.

The paper noted that ensuring quality funding for projects that advance fusion research is vital to global efforts to solve the climate crisis; Efforts to reduce the carbon footprint generated by homes and transportation are essential.