An anonymous reader quotes a report from The New York Times: Scientists have come tantalizingly close to reproducing the power of the sun — albeit only in a speck of hydrogen for a fraction of a second. Researchers at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory reported on Tuesday that by using 192 gigantic lasers to annihilate a pellet of hydrogen, they were able to ignite a burst of more than 10 quadrillion watts of fusion power — energy released when hydrogen atoms are fused into helium, the same process that occurs within stars. Indeed, Mark Herrmann, Livermore’s deputy program director for fundamental weapons physics, compared the fusion reaction to the 170 quadrillion watts of sunshine that bathe Earth’s surface. “This about 10 percent of that,” Dr. Herrmann said. And all of the fusion energy emanated from a hot spot about as wide as a human hair, he said.
But the burst — essentially a miniature hydrogen bomb — lasted only 100-trillionths of a second. Still, that spurred a burst of optimism for fusion scientists who have long hoped that fusion could someday provide a boundless, clean energy source for humanity. The success also signified a moment of redemption for Livermore’s football-stadium-size laser apparatus, which is named the National Ignition Facility, or N.I.F. Despite an investment of billions of dollars — construction started in 1997 and operations began in 2009 — the apparatus initially generated hardly any fusion at all. In 2014, Livermore scientists finally reported success, but the energy produced then was minuscule — the equivalent of what a 60-watt light bulb consumes in five minutes. On Aug. 8, the burst of energy was much greater — 70 percent as much as the energy of laser light hitting the hydrogen target. That is still a losing proposition as an energy source, consuming more power than it produces. But scientists are confident that further jumps in energy output were possible with fine-tuning of the experiment.
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