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Sunday, April 5, 2009

NIF Nuclear Fusion Laser Fires Up

The BBC reports that the construction of a huge laser experiment for conducting inertially confined fusion has been completed. The US National Ignition Facility will use the laser to shoot a pellet containing hydrogen fuel. The hope is that the temperatures involved will be sufficient to overcome the natural repulsive force of the atoms and cause them instead to stick together and form helium, the same process that takes place in the sun. Should it succeed, then the process will deliver 10 to 100 times more energy than the 500 trillion watts sued to fire the device, a process that in the future could satisfy the world´s increasing energy demands.

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