Researchers at Los Alamos National Laboratory have successfully recreated a long-overlooked experiment from 1938 that could potentially power the world with clean energy. The experiment, which involved fusion between deuterium and tritium (DT fusion), was conducted by physicist Arthur Ruhlig nearly a century ago. The team, led by Mark Chadwick, revived and updated the original setup to confirm Ruhlig’s claims that DT fusion is not only possible but highly probable.
Fusion energy works by combining lighter atoms to release vast amounts of energy, similar to the process that powers the sun. Unlike fossil fuels, which produce heat-trapping pollution and radioactive waste, fusion does not give off these pollutants. If harnessed at scale, it could lead to lower electricity bills and energy independence for households and businesses.
The team’s findings were published in Physical Review C and confirmed secondary DT fusion reactions, proving that Ruhlig’s claims were fundamentally correct despite being imprecise by today’s standards. The experiment was conducted at a much lower energy level than previous high-energy experiments, making it accessible to smaller labs and paving the way for more fusion experimentation.
The success of this experiment moves us closer to a cleaner, more affordable energy future. While we’re not yet powering homes with clean energy, developments like this one are an important step towards achieving it. The researchers’ findings also suggest that fusion could power entire cities more affordably than conventional power while helping stabilize the grid.
Source: https://www.thecooldown.com/green-tech/dt-fusion-energy-breakthrough-research