The truth about nuclear fusion power - new breakthroughs

Small Correction - Fission reactions occur all the time in nature. Literally every radioactive element is a fission process. It just normally isn't in high enough concentrations to be a runaway reaction.

I was an intern at the General Atomics Fusion Lab in the 1970's in Torrey Pines. The Russian tokamak configuration was utilized. Dr. Tihiro Ohkawa headed up the Japanese Team, which was collaborating with the American Team, headed by Dr John Landis. Dr Ohkawa envisioned the Doublet II where the Tokamak Donut-shaped plasma was modified so the cross-section , instead of an oval, it became an hourglass. The international fusion research community was so full of promise at that time, then Jimmy Carter cut the long-term research projects budget. Most of us graduate students got out of High-Energy Physics at that point.

Shrimp: punches water so hard that light comes out... Humans: “Write that down.”

Tony Stark built this in a cave! With a box of scraps!

"Don't expect your home to be fusion powered in the next 10 or 20 years." - I'm guessing we'll have fusion reactors powering our homes in 30 years 😃

"The space elevator will be ready 50 years after everyone's done laughing"

5:22 Of course Homer Simpson would love it — He’s a Nuclear Safety Inspector

I can hear it now "oh my god, they are going to drain the oceans"

I have been working on fusion projects since 1986. (With the exception of 5 years I spent at Aerojet working on in space propulsion) I really appreciated this video because I could show this to my family members and it gave them a better idea of what I do for a living. I work on FRC’s.

I’m so inspired to work in this field, one of the most important steps towards an interstellar civilisation

They said we are 30 years away when I was 15, now I'm 55.. and they say still 30 away.. I don't have much time.

The idea of direct electric power from the reaction looks like a really massive game changer.

thx for this overview. I'm a big believer in fusion. The world need this to get rid of our fossil fuel addiction.

An important distinction between stars and reactors. The video implies that fusion in stars happens when two atoms 'slam together'. What actually happens is that two atoms can get close enough together that sometimes they will quantum tunnel past the electrostatic force and are then able to fuse. Otherwise they never meet. Given the vast amount of atoms in a star this happens frequently enough to produce a sustained reaction. This is why nuclear fusion reactors currently use temperatures far exceeding that of the core of the sun, as they don't rely on quantum tunneling but instead actually do 'slam together' atoms as we think of it. Stars wouldn't even be possible this way, as they simply don't get hot enough. A bit of semantics given that nothing really 'touches' to begin with, but nonetheless useful to understand.

1:47 "Fission reactions don't occur naturally in nature." Well, yes, they do.

The meme's always been "50 years away" so there's progress

Good overview. Your productions are high quality. Thanks.

“Don’t expect it within the next 10 or 20 years” 30 years then maybe?

I've watched many videos on fusion. I think this might be the best one I've seen so far. Excellent work. (I'm a systems engineering phd btw)

I remember reading about the reactor at Princeton some 35/40 years ago when I was in middle school. Thanks for a great video, I appreciate the way you pulled all the information together without getting deep into the weeds.