First Light Fusion, a fusion startup based in Oxfordshire, England, announced that it has set a pressure record of 1.85 TPa (editor's note: TPa is a unit of pressure) at its "Z Machine" at Sandia National Laboratories in the United States.
"We are pleased to report that the first attempt on the 'Z-machine' was a great success, breaking the facility's stress record. Nick Hawker, the company's founder and CEO, told the media.
（来源：First Light Fusion 官网）
Anyone who knows about nuclear fusion knows that it uses the same process that stars produce light and heat to fuse hydrogen and other light elements to release large amounts of energy. For years, scientists in the field have been hoping to harness this energy to provide the world with unlimited and zero-carbon electricity.
First Light Fusion, a well-known fusion start-up spun off from the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom in 2011, has been working to address the urgent need to decarbonize the global energy system.
It is understood that the company uses a very special inertial restraint method, called projectile fusion, which aims to create the extreme temperatures and pressures required for fusion by compressing a target with an ultra-high-velocity projectile.
Unlike existing fusions, projectile fusion not only does not have long-lived radioactive waste, but also does not have the risk of reactor meltdown, so the energy obtained in this way can theoretically meet safe, clean and almost unlimited energy requirements.
It is worth mentioning that this method proposed by the company was actually inspired by pistol shrimp.
Pistol shrimp is also known as a shrimp that can "shoot". It has an oversized claw that can be closed with a "click" at very high speeds. Because of its ultra-fast speed, it emits a shock wave into the water and exerts tremendous pressure on the water, causing it to burst and form bubbles.
When the shock wave interacts with the bubble, the bubble bursts as fast as it forms, and the water vapor inside is heated to tens of thousands of degrees and emits a bright flash.
While tens of thousands of degrees here sound amazing, the temperature required for fusion is tens of millions of degrees.
And instead of shrimp claws, First Light Fusion uses a larger, faster "hammer," a high-velocity projectile.
Specifically, since inertial fusion is a pulsed process, just like an internal combustion engine, a spark is triggered and it burns by inputting a small amount of fuel.
（来源：First Light Fusion 官网）
While the main existing inertial fusion methods typically use a large laser as a "spark plug" to drive the triggering of the reaction, projectile fusion is replaced by a high-velocity projectile, that is, the projectile hits a target containing fusion fuel. The target is based on pooling the projectile's energy, driving the fuel to implos, and obtaining the density and temperature necessary for fusion to occur.
Because the velocity required for projectile fusion is so high, the company developed an amplifier and a fuel tank.
The amplifier serves two purposes:
The first is to increase the pressure obtained after the impact of the projectile, providing a higher pressure to the fuel. This amplification reduces the required projectile velocity, but allows the fuel to implode much faster than the original impact.
The second is to achieve convergence. Although the original shock comes from only one side, the fuel is squeezed in multiple directions, so this action is critical to achieving the final density needed for fusion.
In fact, the company's projectile fusion method is very simple.
For example:
For one, the machine that fires the projectile is large, but the technology is not complicated.
Second, while electromagnetic emission involves a delicate balance of many different physical processes, the machine itself is made from low-cost, off-the-shelf components.
Third, the impact of the projectile on the target and the focus of the pressure in the amplifier are also very clear.
Fourth, the concept of a power plant is easy to understand. Specifically, the target is simply thrown into the reaction chamber and the projectile is fired downwards through the same entrance in order to catch up with the target at the right moment. Whereas the shape of the container is simple, there is an inlet hole that allows the use of a liquid first wall.
Because the flowing liquid helps the reactor not to be affected by the enormous energy output, the liquid first wall is able to cleverly circumvent some of the engineering challenges that other fusion methods face.
However, while the company believes that projectile systems can provide the best way to produce electricity competitively, they are also looking at other alternatives.
For example, if the cost of the laser can be significantly reduced, they also plan to develop an additional driver and combine this laser with the current technology design to add additional advantages.
Clearly, First Light Fusion's experiments on the world's most powerful pulsed power facility, the Z-machine, were a test of the company's technology.
"It has a peak power of 80 terawatts, which is more than the power of the entire power grid in the world," First Light Fusion told the media. It fires projectiles electromagnetically, also faster than any other facility in the world. ”
Resources:
https://www.rechargenews.com/energy-transition/the-80-trillion-watt-shot-holy-grail-fusion-energy-pioneer-claims-record-at-world-s-most-powerful-machine/2-1-1609341
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Light_Fusion
Hatps://firstlightfushan.com/
https://firstlightfusion.com/media/first-light-fusion-announces-close-of-series-c-fund-raises
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