The world's most powerful laser is born into a new milestone in controlled nuclear fusion

The target chamber of the National Ignition Device (192 lasers focused on a small helium-neon target).

According to foreign media reports, on March 15th, the National Ignition Facility (NIF) of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California, conducted a super laser experiment in which 192 laser beams were released in an instant. 1.875 megajoules of energy, which is finally introduced into the high temperature target chamber. This is also the world's most powerful laser that released the highest-energy laser blast in history in only 23 billionths of a second. The success of this experiment means that humans have achieved a new milestone in the development of controlled nuclear fusion reactors.

According to Ed Moses, director of the National Ignition Facility (NIF), during the experiment, the laser beam was integrated through a series of lenses and finally focused to form a 2.03 megajoule beam. This bundle of lasers, the strongest in history, lasted 23 billionths of a second, generating 411 megawatts of energy, which is equivalent to a thousand times the amount of electricity consumed by the entire United States at any one time (by relying on electricity stored in capacitors). Released within 30 billionths of a second. Ed Moses believes that the strongest laser experiments conducted by the National Ignition Laboratory demonstrate the laser beam's characteristics in terms of energy, accuracy, power supply facilities, and usability. However, for the original plan, it was almost half completed. .

The National Ignition Laboratory hopes to substantially increase the power of laser emitters by the end of this year. It intends to use this facility to simulate the internal energy response of the Sun, which is to provide energy support for the manufacture of artificial sun. At the same time, the success of this experiment also marks a milestone in the national ignition plan. In the nuclear reaction, the nucleus releases a tremendous amount of energy during the fusion process, and the purpose of the national ignition device is to use such energy. In the current universe, there is a big explosion at all times on the sun and other stars. Hydrogen atoms and deuterium atoms continue to fuse and emit terrible energy. However, such nuclear fusion is an uncontrollable reaction. In the national ignition device, scientists hope that these high-energy beams can be focused on the “globules” of hydrogen isotopes, enabling them to perform similar nuclear reactions and be controlled nuclear fusion.

When the integrated beam moves through a series of amplifiers, their energy increases exponentially. From the beginning to the end of the experiment, the energy of the beam increased from one-billionth of a joule to four million joules. Of course, the whole process only took place in about five millionths of a second. According to national ignition device spokesperson Lynda Seaver, it is because the laser beam is only excited instantaneously, so the cost of this experiment is relatively low, and the price of each test explosion is only five to twenty dollars. The potential is huge. The director of the National Ignition Plant hopes to bring the energy released by the laser beam to equilibrium at the end of this year.

Ed Moses, director of the National Ignition Facility (NIF), believes we have the ability to complete it in the 2012 fiscal year, but experts are not so sure because similar experiments have been challenged in the past. Glen Wurden, a plasma physicist at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, cautioned that caution should be given to “all broken eggs in the laser basket.” (Text / Tencent Technology)

In the national ignition device, the “氘-氚 target pill” and the gold-plated radiation chamber that holds the target.

More than 160 kilometers of high-voltage cables that provide power to the laser's 7,680 strobes.