China's 'Artificial Sun' Breaks Nuclear Fusion Limit Thought to Be Impossible (the-independent.com)
- Reference: 0180557918
- News link: https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/26/01/10/0556228/chinas-artificial-sun-breaks-nuclear-fusion-limit-thought-to-be-impossible
- Source link: https://www.the-independent.com/tech/nuclear-fusion-china-artificial-sun-b2896015.html
> A team from the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) said its experimental nuclear reactor, dubbed the 'artificial Sun', achieved a plasma density that was previously thought impossible... Through a new process called plasma-wall self organisation, the CAS researchers were able to keep the plasma stable at unprecedented density levels. By pushing plasma density well past long-standing empirical limits, the researchers said fusion ignition can be achieved with far higher energy outputs. "The findings suggest a practical and scalable pathway for extending density limits in tokamaks and next-generation burning plasma fusion devices," said Professor Ping Zhu from Huazhong University of Science and Technology, who so-led the research.
>
> Professor Zhu's team now plan to apply this new method on the EAST reactor to confirm that it will work under high-performance plasma conditions. The latest breakthrough was detailed in the journal [2]Science Advances in a study titled 'Accessing the density-free regime with ECRH-assisted ohmic start-up on EAST'.
[1] https://www.the-independent.com/tech/nuclear-fusion-china-artificial-sun-b2896015.html
[2] https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adz3040
Was this nit reported twice before? (Score:5, Informative)
My memory may deceive me, but this could be one of the rare tripple-stories on Slashdot!
Re: (Score:2)
Don't know about triple but:
[1]https://science.slashdot.org/s... [slashdot.org]
Someone must really dislike you to mod you troll for noticing.
[1] https://science.slashdot.org/story/26/01/09/0319216/fusion-physicists-found-a-way-around-a-long-standing-density-limit
Re: (Score:2)
There are a couple of idiot assholes that do not like being called out on their crap. They mistakenly think modding me down for whatever makes their non-existent points stronger.
So, let me guess (Score:3)
Because of this announcement, researchers say that practical fusion energy is - what - only 10 to 15 years away? /s
Re: (Score:1)
I dream of the day when a news story about fusion won't be accompanied by this same old tired attempt at humor. It remains only a dream.
Re: (Score:2)
It's good to hold onto your dreams - no matter how unrealistic!
Re: (Score:1)
> I dream of the day when a news story about fusion won't be accompanied by this same old tired attempt at humor. It remains only a dream.
After 50+ years of every breakthrough reported being followed by "unlimited fusion energy is just 15 to 20 years away" it's kinda hard to not make a joke of it. Duke Nukem Forever was delayed by 14 years and was a similar joke. The promise for fusion being 20 years away has gone through 3 generations now.
Re: (Score:1)
It's not a certain number of years away, it's a certain number of dollars away. This is a solvable engineering problem. Fund it, and they can get it done.
DeepSeek (Score:2)
What was the prompt for that? Formulate, elaborate, quantify and implement one of the reasons why we don't have the orange person as head of our country?
Re:DeepSeek (Score:4, Funny)
> What was the prompt for that? Formulate, elaborate, quantify and implement one of the reasons why we don't have the orange person as head of our country?
Hey. That guy is going to run Venezuela, okay. And he's super busy frog-walking its former dictator and doing armed pursuit of heavy crude oil -- that no one really wants because (a) oil is $60/barrel, (b) it's too heavy to easily refine and (c) the country he's extorting is too politically unstable and lacks sufficient infrastructure for more investment and production. Sure he says Venezuela will "turn over" 50 million barrels (which is only two months of U.S. production), but that will be sold and the proceeds put into commercial banks (no, not the Treasury) for this guy to personally control. Also he got to finish building a ballroom and put his name on a few more buildings... You know, what his people voted for. So he's way too busy grifting, grafting, raping (*cough*) and pillaging to also run China. Geesh. /s