Fusion News: R&D Magazine – Laser fusion experiment yield record energy
R&D Magazine reports on Lawrence Livermore’s breakthrough experiment at the National Ignition Facility in its article, “Laser fusion experiment yield record energy.”
In the early morning hours of Aug.13, 2013, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s National Ignition Facility (NIF) focused all 192 of its ultrapowerful laser beams on a tiny deuterium-tritium filled capsule. In the nanoseconds that followed, the capsule imploded and released a neutron yield of nearly 3×1015, or approximately 8,000 joules of neutron energy—approximately three times NIF’s previous neutron yield record for cryogenic implosions.
The NIF’s Associate Director, Ed Moses, was quoted as saying:
“The yield was significantly greater than the energy deposited in the hot spot by the implosion. This represents an important advance in establishing a self-sustaining burning target, the next critical step on the path to fusion ignition on NIF.”
