Gravitational confinement— Using a ridiculously huge mass to make enough gravity to cause fusion. The sun and stars do this but humans won’t be doing it anytime soon. The quest for breakeven, and beyond We’re very close to achievingbreakeven, which is when we get more energy out of a...
However, that “burst” (or a miniature hydrogen bomb, depending on your point of view) only lasted 100 trillionths of a second. However, with the NIF’s achievement of ignition, Wade says the promise of nuclear fusion is more real than ever. “What’s different today than 20 years ...
Why may hydrogen not be advantageous as a fuel? What are the desirable qualities of an electric battery? What is Nitrolim and it's uses? What is nuclear resonance? Explain in brief. Explain the benefits and drawbacks of nuclear power.Why is the possibility of sustained nuclear fusion as a...
The sun's spherical structure is a result of two constantly competing forces: gravity from the dense mass at the sun's center trying to pull all of its plasma inward versus energy from the nuclear fusion taking place in the core, causing the plasma to expand. The sun is made up ...
I heard the same thinga while ago, but Jupiter is a long way from being a star. That estimate was based on some old nuclear physics (like 1980’s old). By being awesome, and buildingneutrino detectors and big computers, we’ve managed to refine our understanding of ...
North Korea is threatening to test a hydrogen bomb, a weapon more powerful than the atomic bombs that devastated the Japanese cities of Nagasaki and Hiroshima during World War II. Here's how they differ.
Because quasars put out so much power from such a small region, they can’t be powered by nuclear fusion the way stars are; they must use some process that is far more efficient. As we shall see later in this chapter, quasars were much more common when the universe was young than th...
Nuclear fusion occurs when extreme pressure forces the protons in the nucleus of one element to combine or fuse into another, heavier element. Using the ever famous E=mc2, the resulting difference in mass is converted to energy. Some of that released energy is emitted as gamma rays. The fusi...
What would happen if the force of gravity were to disappear suddenly? Can you go fast enough to get enough mass to become a black hole? How do we detect black holes? When a nuclear bomb goes off, does it create a micro black hole? What caused the collapse of the solar ...
What makes fusion on the Sun different? The sun is a fantastic fusion factory. But the sun is massive and the force of gravity provides the necessary energy for fusion to occur in the center of the sun where gravitational forces are greatest. We cannot reproduce this type of force on earth...