48 seconds. I predict a glut of helium. balloons for everyone
Hotter than the surface of the sun by a factor of ~18000.
Hotter than the suns core by a factor of ~7.
https://science.nasa.gov/solar-system/temperatures-across-our-solar-system/#hds-sidebar-nav-1
People talk about Icarus flying too close to the sun. Motherfuckers are recreating it in labs 😂
If Icarus won’t come to the sun, the sun will come to Icarus.
In case the reference is lost, there’s a famous Muslim proverb: if the mountain won’t come to Muhammad, then Muhammad must go to the mountain. A flipped version of this proverb has somehow also become commonly known, perhaps surpassing the correct version (in my culture at least): if Muhammad won’t go to the mountain, then the mountain will come to Muhammad.
Hotter than yo mama …. Wait a minute
Just barely though…
People talk about Icarus flying too close to the sun. Motherfuckers are recreating it in labs
This!
That’s definitely some next-gen level magic being scienced/engineered.
I just want to know what kind of thermometer they put into the plasma to measure the temperature. It must have been made of ice or something to not burn up.
They usually measure extreme high temperatures differently, not with thermometers based on heat expansion of materials. They measure heat radiated, not conducted.
In plain English, they look at it with a heat camera, like you see on TV they patrol borders with.
The power of the sun, in the palm of my hand.
…Icarus was a primitive savage from ancient times…he didn’t have our cool cyberpunk tech
48 seconds at those temperatures is no joke, that is pretty amazing. I didn’t see the article elaborate on what the current limiting factors are for pushing beyond 48 seconds. Like I wonder if it’s a hard wall, a new engineering challenge, a tweak needed, etc. this is the reactor that set the last record so they are doing something really right.
(The article touches on this bit a little) I was watching something about fusion the other day and it seems that it is super tricky to keep the magnetic field balanced in a way that keeps the plasma in a proper toroid. Not only does it need to keep the correct strength, it has to fight against random turbulence. This is critical to start the reaction, but also to maintain it.
Also, they gave some other physical limitations in the article as well:
To extend their plasma’s burning time from the previous record-breaking run, the scientists tweaked aspects of their reactor’s design, including replacing carbon with tungsten to improve the efficiency of the tokamak’s “divertors,” which extract heat and ash from the reactor.
Basically, it’s the container that has limitations as containing a pseudo-sun probably isn’t easy.
According to another commenter the heat generated is 7 times that of the core of the sun. Considering we use the sun in sci fi to destroy anything that can’t be destroyed by other means, controlling that level of heat seems like a real challenge
Yeah. Actually using that heat is the next challenge, I suppose. If I am not mistaken (and I am often mistaken), they are not actually using the reaction to power the reactor yet.
It’s all math, basically. If they measure more energy coming out than they put in, it’s considered a win.
How would they use it to power a reactor? Is it like a regular nuclear reactor where you essentially boil water to power a steam turbine?
I swear a part of my inner child died the day I found out that nuclear reactors are essentially big kettles.
It’s likely going to create steam, just like a reactor today. It is a very effective way to turn a turbine for a generator, after all. All the bits that actually start and maintain the reaction need fuck tons of electricity, so the reaction can literally power itself when attached to a generator.
While there are a ton of formulas for converting energy from heat, to steam, to mechanical energy and then into electricity, it’s all basically the same: more power out than you put in is a good reaction.
Almost forgot, water is dual function. It cools the equipment and it acts as an energy transport. I believe ammonia is more efficient in some circumstances, but water is better for obvious reasons.
Yeah, I mean it makes sense. My inner child wants there to be some sort of magic that splits the atomic nucleus (or in the case of fusion… well you know) and harnesses the energy through some sort of fancy magical-to-us-commonfolk process.
Kettles are great, but not whimsical or fantastic.
How the heat is generated is still wicked-cool and is basically magic. Think about it this way: We are holding a toroid shaped micro-sun in place with magnets. Those magnets need to be adjusted hundreds of times a second to keep everything in its place. Sure, it just boils water, but how it boils water is where the real magic is.
We are building atoms by taking control of the core of a star.
They most likely ran out if liquid helium as the world is running out of the stuff at an alarming rate
Fusion uses hydrogen and produces helium
They use liquid helium to cool the super magnets…
Sure, but they don’t consume it, and let it just boil off. They have massive refrigerant setups to bring it down to temp and keep it there.
Sure, but why does that mean they must be losing the helium each time? I don’t know anything about liquid helium and super conductors, but I know I don’t need to replace my radiator fluid just because it cooled my engine.
Once used, it need to be cooled down to -252c to be reused. Not like a closed loop of oil
Alright, did some research, first off you’re wrong about this being the reason even if this was a plausible reason. The real reason is the ash and heat divertors failed.
Second, you don’t even need liquid helium for super conduction. Here’s a few closed loop helium gas coolers that get to 10 kelvin. They need to be refilled on the scale of years, not from a single test.
https://www.arscryo.com/closed-cycle-cryocoolers https://stirlingcryogenics.com/products/closed-loop-helium-gas-cooling-system/
I get you care deeply about helium loss but this is the last thing you should be accidentally spreading misinformation about. This process literally creates more helium then it uses.
I didn’t say they did, just said probably, I’m just a stupid redneck.
Oh and how do we capture said multi thousand deg helium?
This is such a ridiculous comment. I can literally go on Amazon and buy some helium right now. You really think if that’s possible, a cutting edge research lab would run out of the stuff?
Sure, it’s limited and getting scarcer, but no one’s running out yet.
That doesn’t mean that they didn’t have enough. The world being in the process of losing helium as a whole doesn’t mean these researchers “ran out” of it. If they knew they needed it, they would have purchased it, so unless the world has run out of helium already then they didn’t run out of it. You act like noone there could calculate exactly how much helium this uses per second and just buy x seconds worth of helium.
OK let me rephrase, they ran out of usable liquid helium. You do realise LH is the coldest known substance known. If you have 5L of usable LH once you use the 5L and turn it into a gas it is no longer -254c A sing use of an MRI uses 2000L at say the low end of cost of $30 so $60,000 and that is at room temps now add a few thousand degrees…
A single use of an MRI doesn’t use 2000 liters, that is the upper end of a hospitals ENTIRE supply of helium. On average an MRI users 70 Liters per MONTH of operation. You’re literally just spewing bullshit at this point, have a fun time being completely misinformed on things that upset you greatly, I’m going to go play games
You are right. In a sense, they have to reclaim the helium. It takes 2,000L to run it, they reclaim it compress/cool then reuse it. That 70 L/month is what they loose after use.
Do some reading before being an ass
Hot damn! Limitless fusion power is only thirty years away!
Like it has been for the past 30 years (which, I assume, was the joke here.)
If fusion research was funded adequately we’d probably have it by now, but I don’t know if it’s the energy lobby or what that means that it’s chronically underfunded. An actually working fusion reactor design would bring about such an upheaval in the energy markets that I wouldn’t be surprised if plutocrats had a hand in making sure the research receives orders of magnitude less money than it should.
Existing energy conglomerates (ie, oil and gas) probably send their army of lobbyists around the world to spread FUD about fusion. Thus minimal funding. 🪦
Not while fusion is 30 years away. They’ll wait until it’s closer to 2 years.
Maybe. We all (here) wish fusion power was funded better and understand how useful it could be for humanity if we can make it happen, but ….
- yesterday I read about the Stellerator using 3D printed parts
- in this thread, someone commented on using ai to drive containment
- I’m sure teams must be using the latest materials.
It’s quite possible that we would have always needed the rest of the world to catch up
Breakthroughs will bring in investment and then things can accelerate if it ends up viable.
It’s not limitless, you still need fuel. Especially tritium doesn’t really occur naturally because of its extremely short half-life, current plans for ITER involve breeding tritium from lithium in the fusion reactor. The closest to limitless power we have is PV.
A reactor that produces enough of its own fuel… It’s starting to sound like a perpetual motion machine.
Read again, there are plans to use lithium instead of tritium, still limited.
$10 says fusion power also ends up being the cure for Alzheimer’s.
The advancements in magnetic field manipulation will be of great value to the ferrite-infused prostate medicine field! Also: better selfie camera’s!
Unfortunately the amount of helium made in fusion is so small as to be useless for anything humans need. Fusion is just that efficient.
So no chipmunk voices? 😢
We actually get all of our helium from mining, trapped gas. And we’re running out of the easy to reach stuff. So yes, no more chipmunk voices.
But they’re similar gasses that can do the same thing and even ones that make your voice deeper.
Yes! I’ve heard. I would love to try some of that.
Always careful with gasses. You basically replace a certain amount of capacity in your lungs with them, so you can very much suffocate yourself if you overdo it.
They use orders of magnitude more liquid helium to cool the magnets used to stabalize fusion than they would ever make.
sick. cool. So uh. How long until power generation happens now?
Ah who am i kidding, it’ll be at least a decade, probably more like two. Three including manufacturing and building all the plants.
Well according to the 1993 classic, “SimCity 2000,” fusion power becomes available to build in the year 2050. Since I have no other source that provides an exact date of viability, this remians the most reliable prediction we have.
curious, has SimCity predicted anything correctly up to now?
If my experience with the game was an accurate account, quite a few natural disasters.
Wasn’t that the one with the godzilla natural disaster toggle? If so, i figure the next few years could have some fun surprises… if we’re lucky.
The bell riots, September 2024. See yall there!
When did space solar unlock? The uk is building one now apparently
i like this meta, i agree.
Ah who am i kidding, it’ll be at least a decade, probably more like two.
To be fair, they’re trying to create a miniature star and keep it controlled/contained, to use its energy. That’s some next-gen level stuff.
it’s definitely one of the ideas of all time. i just wish people would stop pretending like it’s “just right around the corner”
Meanwhile germany is burning more coal than it ever has to generate power because they no longer have nuclear energy. And gas is expensive.
Stay in school kids. Study Physics & Engineering!
yep. Given how long it’ll take to develop fusion power, multiple generations of people will have worked on it in practice, and many more in theory.
20 years.
always 20 years off :-)
Since at least the 90s
It was 30 years away in the 1950s and still is.
Controlled fusion is harder than we thought & may be harder than we think.
its right 100% of the time 60% of the time
This is how we arrive at the “always 30 years away” trope.
It’s also just kind of how these things tend to go. I mean even the the funny international one ITER. Has had this exact issue, they keep pushing back deadlines over and over again. Which is only really surprising if you aren’t familiar with the tech, it’s highly complex. But it’s a great example as to why this stuff happens.
100 million degrees C
Sounds hot.
Nah. Not that hot. Now 100 million kelvin, THAT is hot!
C is hotter than K, and F is a mess.
F is just salty
Can we get some Fs in chat?
Sounds hot.
You should see it in a bikini.
One day we will break that record and nobody will ever know again.
Fusion triple product:
the duration the thing worksxinverse of how close you are to melting the reactor vesselxhow large is the reactor vesselOne step closer to getting the T-51s working.
Only 2,543,456,495,596 steps to go
I’d like to know more. How do you actually harness the energy produced by temperatures that high? Is the end goal to figure out how to sustain the reaction at lower temperatures or do we actually have ways to generate electricity from those temperatures without losing most of it to waste?
Same as with almost any other reactor: Steam running through turbines. The high temperatures are important to sustain the fusion process. The goal is that it practically self sustains itself while we just continue to feed it with hydrogen.
Why not magnets
How do those work?
Nobody knows
I think the current designs would all use radiation heat, which means infrared etc light hitting the reactor walls and a coolant (water) running through them to generate steam, and then it’s the good old turbine to electricity process… Light emitted from a plasma that hot isn’t that hot itself / wouldn’t heat reactor walls to the same temps.
Steam turbines aren’t the only way, certain fuel cycles permit direct energy conversion: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_energy_conversion
Can’t be good for our global warming problem, amirite?
Lol ironic isn’t it, considering easy access to fusion power would basically solve the climate crisis.
If you had a bunch of fusion plants running AC units could you reverse global warming?
Ignoring actual practicality… I guess you could run a heat exchanger and dump all the energy into a tiny object then shoot it into space
If you do it in a direction to increase Earth’s orbiting speed it would move us farther away from the sun too.
Soooo, we will all start sounding like Alvin and the Chipmunks soon?
The faster I get my steak the better
I’ll be excited if/when they can harness the power. PS the world is running out of liquid helium that is used to cool the magnets
Think of all the houses they could heat with that!
