Russian Media Focus: New Year, New Breakthrough, China's Tokamak Device Achieves Stable Operation at Ultra-High Plasma Density!
Reuters of Russia quoted the news office of the Chinese Academy of Sciences headquarters on January 1st.
Chinese scientists have for the first time achieved a new method of plasma heating in the EAST tokamak device, which allows electrons to maintain a stable form even under ultra-high density conditions.
Professor Zhu Ping from Huazhong University of Science and Technology said: "We have broken through the main limitations of previous tokamak devices in increasing plasma density. In other words, we have opened the way for the next generation of tokamak devices and other nuclear fusion devices that can maintain plasma combustion."
Professor Zhu Ping and his colleagues explained that a tokamak is a nuclear fusion device that can form and confine a long, high-temperature plasma ring inside it, reaching hundreds of millions of degrees Celsius.
To increase the power and operational efficiency of the device, the plasma in this current must have a high density, thereby increasing the probability of particle reactions within it.
About forty years ago, the famous American physicist Martin Greenwald found that the plasma density in tokamak devices could only be increased to a certain limit, which was related to the internal electron density of the plasma.
Once this critical value is exceeded, the plasma becomes unstable and starts to "escape" from the magnetic field that surrounds it, potentially causing damage to the reactor walls and internal components.
Chinese scientists successfully increased this limit by 1.3 to 1.65 times using two methods.
Professor Zhu Ping and his colleagues stated that these experiments verified the theory of their French counterparts.
Russian media pointed out: Three years ago, the French team proposed that by combining the improved schemes of the aforementioned tokamak device, it could enter a special operating mode - in this mode, the electron density in the plasma no longer imposes strict restrictions on its energy density.
Scientists concluded that this breakthrough will help develop reactors capable of stably extracting energy from fusion reactions.
Original: toutiao.com/article/1853162326357000/
Statement: This article represents the views of the author himself.