
Pulsar Fusion Wants to Build the World's First Nuclear Fusion Rocket Engine, is it Legit?
2 months ago
If accomplished, the Demonstration Rocket for Agile Cislunar Operations (DRACO) spacecraft would be the most advanced spacecraft rocket system ever put into operation. That is unless the team at Pulsar Fusion based out of Bletchley in South East England has their say.

Nuclear fusion breakthrough: Is cheap, clean energy finally here?
4 months ago
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The biggest scientific challenges that AI is already helping to crack
4 months ago
AI isn't just for chatbots – many companies are using it to tackle everything from protein folding and drug development to commercially viable nuclear fusion.

Laser fusion reactors could make their own fuel pellets in a flash
5 months ago
As the question of how to make a laser fusion reactor practical rises, scientists at the University of Rochester’s Laboratory for Laser Energetics (LLE) have come up with a way for fusion lasers to essentially manufacture their own fuel pellets.

Helion to supply Microsoft with fusion power by 2028, or pay penalties
7 months ago
In an outrageously audacious move, Washington-based fusion power startup Helion has signed the world's first fusion power supply deal, promising to deliver Microsoft at least 50 megawatts of clean fusion power by 2028, or pay financial penalties.

Tokamak Energy unveils images of fusion power plant slated for 2030s
8 months ago
Tokamak Energy has released the first images of what its commercial fusion power plant, which it says would safely generate enough electricity to power 50,000 homes in the 2030s, would look like.

New discovery points the way to more compact fusion power plants
8 months ago
A magnetic cage keeps the more than 100 million degree Celsius hot plasmas in nuclear fusion devices at a distance from the vessel wall so that they do not melt. This could make it possible to build smaller and cheaper fusion reactors for energy production.

Simplified calculations reproduce complex plasma flows
8 months ago
Accurate and fast calculation of heat flow (heat transport) due to fluctuations and turbulence in plasmas is an important issue in elucidating the physical mechanisms of fusion reactors and in predicting and controlling their performance.

Resistance in tokamak vessel walls can cause disruptive energy loss
9 months ago
Under certain conditions, the fusion devices known as tokamaks can suffer a sudden loss of energy to the vessel walls. Researchers call this energy loss process a disruption. One cause is a magnetohydrodynamic (i.e., conducting plasma in a magnetic field) instability, or mode, coupling to the vacuum vessel.

Westinghouse eVinci: The Pint-Sized Mini Reactor Designed to Kick Diesel to the Curb
9 months ago
But nuclear fusion is still a pie-in-the-sky fantasy aspiration despite all the good news recently. That said, you shouldn't overlook what's been happening on the fission side of things.

Laser shots could spark additional discoveries in astrophysics
9 months ago
In December, the National Ignition Facility (NIF) at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory made headlines worldwide. This first-of-its-kind result will provide invaluable insight into the potential for clean energy from fusion.

TAE makes world-first readings of magnetically-confined H-B fusion
9 months ago
We've spoken to this California company before about its impressive progress and ambitious plans in the fusion power space. With more than US$1.2 billion in investments behind it, TAE has come in ahead of schedule with results from its fifth-generation fusion device, called Norman, which was designed to sustain plasma at 30 million °C (54 million °F), but which has already broken through 75 million °C (135 million °F).

Power plasma with gigajoule energy turnover generated for eight minutes
9 months ago
After successful recommissioning in autumn 2022, the Greifswald nuclear fusion experiment has surpassed an important target. In 2023, an energy turnover of 1 gigajoule was targeted. Now the researchers have even achieved 1.3 gigajoules and a new record for discharge time on Wendelstein 7-X: the hot plasma could be maintained for eight minutes.

Stuck in the rough: How aging reactor walls may exhibit lower erosion
10 months ago
As plasma circulates in a fusion device, the surface of the device that faces the plasma erodes. This releases particles of surface material. Most erosion occurs through a process called sputtering, where a particle strikes a surface and results in the ejection of atoms from that surface.

Researchers report on metal alloys that could support nuclear fusion energy
10 months ago
At the end of 2022, researchers at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory announced they had observed a net energy gain through nuclear fusion for the very first time.

New strategy uses ionic liquids to change laser colors with ease
10 months ago
Lasers are intense beams of colored light. Depending on their color and other properties, they can scan your groceries, cut through metal, eradicate tumors, and even trigger nuclear fusion. But not every laser color is available with the right properties for a specific job.

Confirming the theory behind the formation of planets, stars and black holes
a year ago
The first laboratory realization of the long-standing but never-before confirmed theory of the puzzling formation of planets, stars and supermassive black holes by swirling surrounding matter has been produced at PPPL.

Gaia helps discover directly imaged planet undergoing nuclear fusion
a year ago
Scientists have used the subtle movements of a distant star to help discover a new exoplanet—which is displaying signs of undergoing nuclear fusion in its core.

International fusion energy project faces delays, says chief
a year ago
An international project in nuclear fusion may face "years" of delays, its boss has told AFP, weeks after scientists in the United States announced a breakthrough in their own quest for the coveted goal.

Cooling 100 million degree plasma with a hydrogen-neon mixture ice pellet
a year ago
At ITER—the world's largest experimental fusion reactor, currently under construction in France through international cooperation—the abrupt termination of magnetic confinement of a high temperature plasma through a so-called "disruption" poses a major open issue.

Achieving nuclear fusion would be building on the shoulders of giants
a year ago
It took generations of work by engineers and scientists to reach this month’s nuclear fusion milestone, but there are big challenges ahead, says Matthew Sparkes.