/r/fusion
Discussion and news on advancements in the field of nuclear fusion energy and related technologies.
Nuclear Fusion on Reddit
Focused on advancements in the field of nuclear fusion.
Submissions should be related to nuclear fusion or plasma physics as currently understood by the scientific community.
Nuclear fusion is a nuclear reaction in which two or more atomic nuclei collide together at a very high speed and form a new nucleus. For light elements like hydrogen or helium the fused nucleus weights less than the sum of the original nucleus. The missing mass is released as energy in accordance with Einstein's mass-energy equivalence equations. Fusion is the process that powers active or "main sequence" stars.
Current mainstream approaches include:
Magnetic confinement, used in tokamak, spheromak and stellarator designs
Inertial confinement, used at the National Ignition Facility
Electrostatic confinement, used by the fusor and Polywell devices
Magnetized target fusion and Magneto-Inertial fusion, hybrid approaches used by General Fusion and Helion Energy
Related:
/r/fusion
I can only see global discussion
I recently saw a comment on a recent fusion post that mentioned CBF had been proven impossible. I am aware there are many obstacles and downside, but how can it be “proven” impossible?
The working principle behind CBF:
Energy measured in electron volts, eV, is a measure of energy. This can take the form of temperature or velocity which are “interchangeable” at atomic scales. When a particle has 100keV of energy in the form of temperature, this is randomized motion. In the context of beam motion, this 100keV of energy is focused in a specific direction. The idea behind CBF is to use all of the particles energy toward overcoming the Coulomb barrier, as particle motion instead of temperature.
Two beams pointed at each other could each carry half the overall needed energy through motion instead of needing to be heated to several million degrees in a randomized soup of hope.
Is the scattering effect simply too extreme, can we not get the focused interaction cross sectional area small enough to overcome this? If anyone has direct sources of this being proven “impossible” could you point me toward it?
CEO and co founder of Thea Energy (in the beginning Princeton Stellarators) also about future and timeline.
https://thefusionreport.substack.com/p/top-highlights-from-seattle-fusion
This week, some of the best, brightest, and most influential people in the fusion energy industry ventured North by Northwest for Seattle Fusion Week, organized by the CleanTech Alliance. The conference covered a wide range of topics, including the fusion market's potential to generate $1 trillion in revenue by 2050, the projected $2.5 billion supply chain in 2024, and the millions of new jobs that fusion energy is expected to create over the next two decades. Highlights of the event included an address by Jean Paul Allain, Associate Director Office of Science leading the Fusion Energy Sciences (FES), Jay Inslee (D), Washington State Governor, and an Avalanche Energy factory tour and sessions from dozens of fusion energy experts (for a complete list of speakers, please click here).
Fusion energy could make pumpkins glow brighter than ever 🎃 Tune in each Friday for a new issue of #UncertaintyPrinciple comic strip, where we make the fusion energy industry fun!
#Halloween #ScienceHumor #FusionEnergy
Pretty much the title. I know LPPF / Dense Plasma Focuses have their issues. And the low hanging fruit is Lerner's astrophysics theories / err personality? But some seriously... questionable startups/experiments are getting more than an appropriate amount of funding. I have not noticed LPPF on any of the ARPA/Congress/etc. posts of funding. But I see muon-catalyzed, LENR, seemingly backyard projects, etc. stuff. Am I missing their funding notifications, do they suck at securing funding (respectfully), or do people really just not find them as credible as literally any other team?
Hi everyone! I'm talking to CFS tomorrow for scientific software engineering and real-time control software engineering and am definitely feeling the imposter syndrome kicking in despite several days of preparation. I've searched hard on Indeed and Glassdoor to get a sense of what to expect when talking to their managers, but wanted to ask the experts. If you've talked to commonwealth before, how did it go and what should I expect?
hey guys, do you know about any failed fusion ideas?
Stuff like sonofusion or things in cold fusion. Stuff that we know don't work, but we might have had hope for them at one time. Bonus points for anything that got a decent amount of funding!
Any thoughts appreciated!
Edit: Thankyou for the sugguestions! Greatly appreciated :3
I am in the final stage of my PhD, and my tentative end date is August 2025. I work on modeling blanket materials for nuclear fusion reactors. Normally my work involves calculating the interaction of helium with the material and finding whether it will inhibit bubble formation. I believe these works are preliminary. I want to devote myself fully to work in nuclear fusion reactors and learn both experimental and computational methods. But I am not finding the way to go towards it. Since my age is also 31, whatever I do, I will need at least minimum amount of fellowship so that I don't have to depend on extra jobs. I am willing to do enginnering, MS, or even another PhD if need to. Can anyone give me some guidance on what to do and how to approach this ?
What exact process is undergone that causes the energy to be released and not just "a small amount of mass is converted into energy"
Hi everyone,
I’m currently an international engineering physics student with a keen interest in fusion energy and am looking for internship opportunities to gain practical experience in the field. I’ve noticed that some fusion companies don’t have any internship positions advertised at the moment.
Do you think it’s worth sending a proactive email to these companies to express my interest and inquire about potential opportunities, even if they don’t have any internships listed? Has anyone had success with this approach in the past? Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks!