2023-08-18 13:01:56
Graduate student Alexandra LeViness next to part of a stellarator, a twisted fusion device designed to confine ultra-hot plasma to facilitate fusion reactions. -ELLE STARKMAN
MADRID, 18 Ago. (EUROPA PRESS) –
Princeton Scientists have found a mathematical shortcut that can help harness fusion energy, a potential source of clean and inexhaustible energy.
The method makes it easier to predict how much a stellarator, a twisted device designed to reproduce the fusion energy that powers the sun and stars, can retain heat crucial to accomplish fusion reactions.
“We cannot simulate the motions of all individual particles in all possible magnetic fields, that would require almost infinite computing power,” he said. it’s a statement Alexandra LeViness, a graduate student in plasma physics at PPPL (Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory). “Instead, we have to use a shortcut,” said LeViness, lead author of the paper reporting the results. in Nuclear Fusion magazine.
“This research shows that we can find the best magnetic field shape to confine heat by calculating something easier: how far fast particles move away from the curved surfaces of the magnetic field in the center of the plasmaLeViness said. “This behavior is described by a number known as gamma C, which we found to consistently correspond to plasma confinement.”
In effect, the shortcut advances future stellarator research, LeViness said, “because the more fast-moving particles that remain in the center of the plasma, the hotter the fuel and the more efficient the stellarator.”
Fusion releases vast amounts of energy by combining light elements in the form of plasma, the hot, charged state of matter made up of free electrons and atomic nuclei that makes up 99% of the visible universe. Scientists around the world seek to harness fusion reactions to create a virtually inexhaustible supply of safe, clean energy to generate electricity.
the stellarators, developed by PPPL founder Lyman Spitzer in the 1950s, they work without the risk of damaging interruptions faced by doughnut-shaped fusion devices called tokamaks. But they have long been unable to contain heat as well as tokamakswhich have similar magnetic fields.
“But using techniques like the one LeViness studied, we’ve been able to find magnetic configurations for stellars that contain heat just as well as tokamaks,” said Elizabeth Paul, an assistant professor of applied physics at Columbia University.
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