Scientists are working to dramatically speed up the development of fusion energy in an effort to deliver power to the electric grid soon enough to help mitigate impacts of climate change. The arrival of a breakthrough technology—high-temperature ...
Plasma Physics
Nov 5, 2018
52
629
Scientists seeking to bring fusion—the power that drives the sun and stars—down to Earth must first make the state of matter called plasma superhot enough to sustain fusion reactions. That calls for heating the plasma ...
Plasma Physics
Apr 21, 2018
154
228
Birds do it and so do doughnut-shaped fusion facilities called "tokamaks." But tokamak chirping— a rapidly changing frequency wave that can be far above what the human ear can detect—is hardly welcome to researchers who ...
Plasma Physics
Mar 16, 2018
0
81
A laser-driven technique for creating fusion that dispenses with the need for radioactive fuel elements and leaves no toxic radioactive waste is now within reach, say researchers.
Plasma Physics
Dec 13, 2017
47
2161
A key hurdle for fusion researchers is understanding turbulence, the ripples and eddies that can cause the superhot plasma that fuels fusion reactions to leak heat and particles and keep fusion from taking place. Comprehending ...
Plasma Physics
Oct 14, 2017
27
179
Scientists have discovered a remarkably simple way to suppress a common instability that can halt fusion reactions and damage the walls of reactors built to create a "star in a jar." The findings, published in June in the ...
Plasma Physics
Aug 18, 2017
15
660
(Phys.org)—A team of researchers from several institutions in China has developed a new way to produce neutrons that they claim improves on conventional methods by a factor of 100. In their paper published in the journal ...
Everyone knows that the game of billiards involves balls careening off the sides of a pool table—but few people may know that the same principle applies to fusion reactions. How charged particles like electrons and atomic ...
Plasma Physics
Apr 6, 2017
1
166
Researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) and General Atomics have simulated a mysterious self-organized flow of the superhot plasma that fuels fusion reactions. The findings ...
Plasma Physics
Apr 5, 2017
1
122
The energy density contained in the center of a star is higher than we can imagine - many billions of atmospheres, compared with the 1 atmosphere of pressure we live with here on Earth's surface.
General Physics
Jan 11, 2017
2
132
