U.S. engineers plan to use controlled nuclear fusion reactor "artificial sun"

U.S. engineers plan to use controlled nuclear fusion reactor "artificial sun"

Human research on controllable nuclear fusion devices will someday become an artificial sun in orbit.

According to foreign media reports, nuclear engineers at Purdue University in West Midlands, Indiana, USA, developed a new device for nuclear fusion reactors. The device has been installed in Princeton University's experimental nuclear fusion reactor and is used primarily to accurately observe when high temperature plasmas contact and interact with the inside surface of the reactor. This work aims to understand the interaction mechanism of the plasma wall to help nuclear physicists develop physical conditions that can withstand the extremes of a nuclear fusion reactor. The fusion reactor referred to here is called the Tokamak nuclear fusion device. The project is approved by the U.S. Department of Energy and the U.S. Department of Energy’s Nuclear Fusion Energy Science Office is responsible.

The Tokamak nuclear fusion facility is a reactor based on the use of large-scale nuclear fusion reactions to generate "infinite energy" and is also an ITER project. Nuclear fusion is the process of forming a heavier nucleus and a light nucleus through nuclear reactions through two light nuclears. The mass loss generated in this process will release enormous energy. The current hydrogen bomb in a nuclear arsenal is an uncontrollable nuclear fusion device, just like the never-ending release of energy from the sun's surface. If this energy can be grasped by humans and undergo a nuclear reaction under controlled circumstances, it can obviously produce Nearly unlimited clean energy. Nuclear fusion reactions are obtained from seawater through nuclear reactions such as helium and neon, and the radioactive contamination from nuclear fission reactions is much greater than nuclear fusion.

According to calculations by nuclear physicists, the energy generated by nuclear fusion reactors is more than 10 times that of conventional nuclear fission reactors that we use. Not only fusion reactors have inexhaustible raw materials, and the resulting pollution is also very small. According to Jean Paul Allain, associate professor of the nuclear engineering project, in the nuclear fusion reactor, we are confining high-temperature plasma movements by magnetic fields. This is because such high-temperature plasmas have almost no material to withstand. Therefore, using magnetic fields to constrain its behavior is one of the biggest challenges in nuclear fusion reactors. We must also understand the effect of plasma on the inner wall of fusion reactors. This is also a big unknown. After all, we cannot see exactly what happened between the plasma and the inner wall.

Currently, Purdue University researchers are at Princeton University's plasma physics laboratory and operate the largest spherical tokamak reactor in the United States. This reactor is also known as the American National Spherical Ring Experiment. In specific experimental operations, nuclear physics researchers will use material analysis particle probes attached to the lower part of the tokamak device. These customized probes must be made small enough to accommodate reactor conditions. Jean Paul’s associate professor of nuclear engineering believes that this is also an engineering feat. Such a small probe must match a few-foot-high instrument kit. This kind of micro-material will be placed inside the reactor, in the high-temperature plasma and reactor wall. There are, and direct contact with, high-temperature plasma behavior and the resulting response.

The reason why the development of such adaptation and inner wall materials is of great significance is because within the nuclear fusion reactor of extreme physical conditions, the magnetic field must also be used to constrain the behavior of high-temperature plasma, and the materials are directly exposed to such high levels. Temperatures, in the order of millions of degrees Celsius, naturally produce a variety of unexpected changes, which is also a major challenge for the coating on the inner walls of nuclear fusion reactors. In the past, nuclear physicists mainly induced the behavior of isothermal ions through thin film materials.

Associate Professor Jean Paul believes that it is not yet clear what kind of mechanism is working in it. It was mainly through the empirical law summed up through the Edisonian method, that is, through a lot of experiments found or summarized suitable for nuclear fusion reactors. material. If we need to achieve a perfect nuclear fusion reaction and master this "infinite energy" technology, we need to understand all of them. Thus, the purpose of this probe is to provide information on how the coating material changes under high-temperature plasma conditions and the plasma itself interacts to produce changes. The resulting data will help researchers develop new materials for use inside reactor pressure vessels.

However, at present, there is no physical material for nuclear fusion that can sustain these extremely high-temperature plasmas and heat fluxes. Once materials are exposed to high-temperature plasma, they will decompose and melt immediately, not to mention nuclear fusion reactors. Internal material. Therefore, to develop these materials, it is first necessary to find out how to operate and control the inner wall of the reactor, and the change of the action when the high-temperature plasma comes into contact with the inner wall.

At present, the effect of high-temperature plasma on the inner wall material is analyzed. After about one year of operation, the sample to be tested from the reactor is taken out for analysis. Therefore, the research team headed by the associate professor of nuclear engineering of Jean Paul also cooperated with the researchers of the Nanotechnology Research Center of Purdue University to analyze the inner wall test materials used in the Princeton University Tokamak fusion device. This is also the mission of the new type of probe, allowing nuclear physicists to study the interaction of materials and plasma on the inner wall under high temperature plasma conditions. Finally, we integrate new material analysis data for creating A new calculation model guides the design of new materials and applies them to this tokamak device.

Researchers Brian Haim and Sean spent six weeks at Princeton University this summer to set up a complete set of instruments. The detailed experimental results were discussed at the 24th Nuclear Fusion Engineering Symposium held in Chicago and the 38th International Plasma Science Conference hosted by the Nuclear Engineering Program of Purdue University. The specific document information will be next year's "Plasma Science Published in the journal. According to Associate Professor Jean Paul, the equipment can be completely remote controlled and implemented through related remote control software. In principle, it can be considered that it can be controlled anywhere in the world. Therefore, international nuclear engineering researchers have the opportunity to apply. use.

Bryan Heim, the lead researcher of the project, and Associate Professor Jean Paul Paul started research on nuclear fusion reactors at the undergraduate level. The project also involved other students in nuclear engineering: doctoral students Zhangcan Yang and Chase Taylor, and participating researchers: Sean Gonderman and Miguel Gonzalez (Miguel). Gonzalez), Sami Ortoleva and Eric Collins.

Multi-stage Centifugal Pump

Multi-Stage Centifugal Pump,Horizontal Multi-Stage Centrifugal Pump,Multi-Stage Centrifugal Water Pump

Shenyang pump products sales co., LTD , https://www.syipsc.com