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DeepMind, the AI lab backed by Google parent company Alphabet, today announced that it used AI to successfully control superheated matter inside a nuclear fusion reactor. The lab claims that the system, which is detailed in a paper published in the journal Nature, could allow scientists to investigate how such matter reacts under different conditions. While DeepMind remains engaged in prestige projects like systems that can beat champions at StarCraft II and Go, the lab has in recent years turned its attention to more practical domains, such as code generation, language processing, weather forecasting, app recommendations, and video compression. DeepMind...

The Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST) in Hefei in the east Chinese province of Anhui reports a new temperature record. At the end of last year, a plasma temperature of 70 million ° C could be maintained in the experimental nuclear fusion reactor for 1056 seconds, i.e. a good 17 minutes, reports the Institute for Plasma Physics at the Chinese Academy of Sciences (ASIPP). That is the longest time in which such a temperature could be kept constant. This creates a solid basis for further research into energy generation from nuclear fusion, writes the ASIPP. Its general director Prof. Yuntao...

Scientists in Germany said Thursday they had reached a milestone in a quest to derive energy from nuclear fusion, billed as a potentially limitless, safe and cheap source. [...] After spending a billion euros and nine years' construction work, physicists working on a German project called the "stellarator" said they had briefly generated a superheated helium plasma inside a vessel -- a key point in the experimental process. [...] The German experiment, using a machine called Wendelstein 7-X, was aimed at seeing whether it was possible to heat helium atoms with a microwave laser and to briefly contain the plasma...

Researchers could be one step closer to producing energy through nuclear fusion with word that a device called the stellarator is set to go online later this year in Germany. The largest contraption its kind, the Wendelstein 7-X fusion device is housed in a branch of the Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics (IPP) near Munich. It won’t actually produce energy, the Institute said, but will be used to test the “specially shaped magnet coils which produce a magnetic cage which confines the plasma and keeps it away from the walls of the plasma vessel.”

But one group of UK researchers says that the key is to think smaller, and to mash together spherical reactors (a squashed-up version of regular-shaped reactors) and high temperature superconductors to accelerate the development of fusion energy. Their early prototype devices have a 1.2m diameter, and next up, they’re are aiming to build machines that are 3m high with a 2.5m diameter. ... “Instead of making bigger reactors, you go to a higher [magnetic] field that enables you to contain the plasma in an effective way.” ... “The idea is that the tokamak is like a magnetic bottle. On the...

Nuclear New York Energy Week: Fusion Energy Sooner and Cheaper? By Andrew Holland on June 18, 2015 at 2:00 PM A worker welds a part on the exterior of the Wendelstein 7-X experimental fusion reactor at the Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics on October 29, 2013 in Greifswald, Germany. (Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images) What would it mean to have an essentially limitless amount of energy? If we can harness fusion power, we can have energy that is clean, safe, sustainable, and secure. It will be the power of a sun on earth. The dream of fusion energy...

Nuclear fusion is the dream of energy scientists the world over, because it promises limitless, clean electricity. Most efforts to kickstart the process use high-intensity lasers, insane magnetic field and super-hot hydrogen plasmas. But there may be a more humble alternative. It's called sonofusion, and it involves bubbles.Nuclear fusion is the process through which the cores of atoms, called nuclei, collide to form a new, larger atomic nucleus. When the two nuclei are of a lower mass than iron, the reaction creates energy—lots and lots of energy. For instance, when two hydrogen nuclei smash into each other, they creating...

Dr. Eddie DewaldA millimeter-sized fuel capsule inside its target can, or hohlraum. As it approaches its fifth birthday, the National Ignition Facility (NIF), a troubled laser fusion facility in California, has finally produced some results that fusion scientists can get enthusiastic about. In a series of experiments late last year, NIF researchers managed to produce energy yields 10 times greater than produced before and to demonstrate the phenomenon of self-heating that will be crucial if fusion is to reach its ultimate goal of “ignition”—a self-sustaining burning reaction that produces more energy than it consumes.“This is a very significant achievement, and...

Nuclear fusion hits energy milestone Total energy input still far higher than output For the first time, fuel for a nuclear fusion reaction has generated more energy than put into it – a scientific milestone. Scientists and futurists have long dreamed of harnessing the energy of nuclear fusion, which powers the sun, here on Earth. An enormous amount of energy is released when multiple atoms collide and fuse to form a new, heavier atom — such as hydrogen fusing into helium. Hydrogen fuel is plentiful in sources such as seawater and the fusion process generates no radioactive waste, greenhouse gases...

In each trial, 192 laser beams briefly fired into a half-inch-long gold cylinder. The cylinder held a tiny ball that contained the fuel, which was a mix of two kinds of hydrogen, called deuterium and tritium. The energy from the lasers kicked off a process that compressed the ball by an amount akin to squeezing a basketball down to the size of a pea, said Debbie Callahan, an author of the paper. That created the extremely high pressure and temperatures needed to get the hydrogen atoms to fuse. It was all over in the blink of an eye, with the...

Researchers at a laboratory in California say they've had a breakthrough in producing fusion reactions with a giant laser. The success comes after years of struggling to get the laser to work and is another step in the decades-long quest for fusion energy. Omar Hurricane, a researcher at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, says that for the first time, they've produced significant amounts of fusion by zapping a target with their laser. "We've gotten more energy out of the fusion fuel than we put into the fusion fuel," he says. Strictly speaking, while more energy came from fusion than went into...

Researchers at a US lab have passed a crucial milestone on the way to their ultimate goal of achieving self-sustaining nuclear fusion. Harnessing fusion - the process that powers the Sun - could provide an unlimited and cheap source of energy. But to be viable, fusion power plants would have to produce more energy than they consume, which has proven elusive. Now, a breakthrough by scientists at the National Ignition Facility (NIF) could boost hopes of scaling up fusion. NIF, based at Livermore in California, uses 192 beams from the world's most powerful laser to heat and compress a small...

Resource depletion, climate change and rising oil prices have led to large investments in renewable energy and new fossil fuel extraction techniques. However despite the positive headlines on solar, wind, and shale, all of these sectors are beset with problems that add to our uncertain energy future. We appear to be decades away from finding a renewable source that will help us avoid the impending energy crisis. Yet amongst this bleak outlook a relatively unknown Italian inventor could be about to spark an energy revolution? Andrea Rossi appears to have produced the first working “cold” fusion device, or low energy...

It may look like any average building but behind closed doors could lie the answer to safe renewable energy of the future. Here at the National Ignition Facility in Livermore California, scientists are aiming to build the world's first sustainable fusion reactor by 'creating a miniature star on Earth'. Following a series of key experiments over the last few weeks, the £2.2 billion project has inched a little closer to its goal of igniting a workable fusion reaction by 2012.

/begin my excerpts N. Korea Might Have Tested Fusion Process Ju Yong-joong Two days after May 12 announcement, eight times the normal level of radioactive substance Xenon was detected Government kept it under wraps It has been revealed on June 20 that the northern most monitoring station under Korea Institute of Nuclear Safety (KINS) detected eight times the normal level of radioactive substance Xenon right after N. Korea announced on May 12 that it had successful nuclear fusion process, key technology to make hydrogen bomb. It is raising the possibility that N. Korea actually conducted a small-scale nuclear test (required)...

/begin my summary N. Korean Newspaper Repeats the Claim of "Successful Nuclear Fusion" with Added Details of Technical Difficulty 2010.05.15 11:51 N. Korea repeated its claims that it successfully achieved nuclear fusion with indigenous technology. In a May 15th article titled 'Nuclear Fusion for Developing Future Energy (source),' N. Korea's (official daily) Rodong Shinmun claimed, "Despite vicious sanction and pressure, we successfully achieved nuclear fusion process for new energy with our own unique way. It is a feat we should be proud of," accompanied by detailed report on the principles of nuclear fusion and its technical difficulty. /end my summary

(2nd LD) N. Korea claims it succeeded in nuclear fusion By Sam Kim and Byun Duk-kun SEOUL, May 12 (Yonhap) -- North Korea said Wednesday it succeeded in producing a nuclear fusion reaction, a claim that appeared to be aimed at increasing its bargaining power before the communist state rejoins stalled six-nation talks on its nuclear ambitions. Fusion reaction results in a thermonuclear explosion, such as one generated by a hydrogen bomb, which is far more powerful than a fission atomic device. Experts, however, say practical energy creation from fusion is decades away. "The successful nuclear fusion marks a great...

Note: The following blog entry is a quote: http://www.thememriblog.org/iran/blog_personal/en/20268.htm Iranian Nuclear Chief: We'll Progress In Nuclear Fusion Iranian Atomic Energy Organization director Ali Akbar Salehi has said that Iran is researching nuclear fusion and that it will make great progress in that area. Source: ISNA, Iran, September 22, 2009 Posted at: 2009-09-23 ### ### Note: The following blog entry is a quote: http://www.thememriblog.org/blog_personal/en/20234.htm Blog Details Iran: We've Started Producing Improved Centrifuges Iranian Atomic Energy Organization director Ali Akbar Salehi says that Iran has begun to produce a new generation of improved centrifuges, and that he assesses that Israel is not...

Scientists at a US Navy laboratory have announced a discovery that may change the world—if it isn’t another false alarm: Scientists in possible cold fusion breakthrough.

A picture from the patent filing for what General fusion is trying to build with backing from Chrysalix Energy Venture Capital. GF will build a ~3 meter diameter spherical tank filled with liquid metal (lead-lithium mixture). Rams use compressed steam to accelerate pistons to ~50 m/s. Make compression wave in the liquid metal. Microsecond of fusion once per second. Note: This could be considered like a variant of "steam punk nuclear fusion" made real if it works.