Fusion News

PPPL November 20, 2017 (Photo by Elle Starkman/Office of Communications) David A. Gates David A. Gates, principal research physicist and Stellarator Physics Division Head at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL), has been named editor-in-chief of Plasma, an online open access journal for plasma physics. “I am excited to join the … Read more

Eurofusion November 8th 2017 How special forces combine to catch plasma killers THE FACTS It had all started well. We managed to heatup the reactant in order to make the expected fusion reaction happen: in this case, deuterium, an hydrogen isotope. We initiated a current into the tokamak, that strange doughnut-shaped reactor. Very strong magnetic … Read more

ITER 16 NOV, 2017 The governing body of the ITER Organization, the ITER Council, met for the twenty-first time on 15 and 16 November 2017 under the chairmanship of Won Namkung (Korea). Representatives from China, the European Union, India, Japan, Korea, Russia and the United States reviewed a detailed set of reports and indicators covering … Read more

Euro Fusion November 8th 2017 A prototype of the VERDI detector, prior to initial testing. In commercial fusion power plants, the energy deposited by neutrons into a blanket surrounding a plasma will provide power to the national grid. JET has shown that deuterium and tritium create a promising fuel for fusion, producing neutrons travelling at … Read more

Euro Observer 15. NOV, 2017 The ITER machine is being built in the south of France (Photo: © ITER Organization) As climate negotiators were discussing words and commas in preparation for implementing the Paris agreement at one area of the Bonn climate conference in Germany, another zone is reminiscent of a trade fair – with … Read more

IAEA NOV 15, 2017 Francois Ryter from Germany’s Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics has won the IAEA’s 2017 Nuclear Fusion Journal Prize for experimental work elucidating a mechanism that can trigger a fusion plasma (see video) to a state that allows the fusion device to operate under high performance, the journal’s Board of Editors … Read more

Texas A&M NOVEMBER 10, 2017 By: Lorian Hopcus Fusion is the process that powers the sun, harnessing it on Earth would provide unlimited clean energy. However, researchers say that constructing a fusion power plant has proven to be a daunting task, in no small part because there have been no materials that could survive the … Read more

PPPL November 13, 2017 Physicist Brian Grierson and engineer Nevell Greenough A breakthrough in the development of fusion diagnostics and the creative use of radio frequency waves to heat the plasma that fuels fusion reactions earned the 2017 outstanding research and engineering awards from the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL). … Read more

Eurofusion November 8th 2017 Harnessing the energy generated by a fusion reactor while simultaneously generating more tritium fuel to sustain the reaction is no easy task. However, that is what is required from a blanket, the enormous structure that lines the outside of the first wall. ENERGY CAPTURE The energy given off in a fusion … Read more

Eurofusion November 8th 2017 Picture 1: Schematic diagram of the tritium breeding inside a fusion reactor. Deuteriumtritium atoms fuse in a hot plasma to produce one atom of helium-4 atom, one neutron and, along with it, energy. The fusion neutrons will escape the plasma and react with lithium atoms present in the so-called breeding blanket … Read more