China’s “Artificial Sun” Tokamak Breaks Plasma Confinement Records

2022 kicks off with yet another new plasma confinement record for a nuclear fusion project somewhere around the world; this time around, the spotlight is set on China, whose Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST), nicknamed the “artificial sun,” manages to contain plasma at around 70 million °C (126 million °F) for 1,056 seconds, or just a bit shy of eighteen (18) minutes. The news was broken by the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Plasma Physics (ASIPP) and news website China Daily.

For decades now, scientists all around the world have been hard at work chasing the dream of limitless, clean energy; they’ve got their sights set on the mechanism that powers the Sun itself, with studies and research on the topic converging on the common goal of replicating what happens in our Sun’s stellar cores every moment here on the surface of our planet.

Of course, given the extreme conditions present inside the Sun, replicating the process within the confines—or really, lack thereof—of our Earthly existence has consistently proven to be quite a challenge. That doesn’t stop our experts from trying, though—and the results certainly show their drive.

The common goal here is to sustain a high enough amount of energy to leave heavy hydrogen isotopes within the tokamak with no other choice than to smash into each other, initiating nuclear fusion in the process. Hopefully, the heat generated by the entire process is enough to keep it self-sustained, meaning we no longer need to feed energy into the reactor to keep it running.

EAST is actually part of a greater project, called the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) project; as one of its major contributors, EAST has given the scientists that run it even more reason to continue, as its record-breaking 1,056-second confinement of high-temperature plasma is a world first. That means that for some 17 minutes and some change, EAST managed to contain plasma that’s 2.6 times hotter than the core of the Sun.

“We achieved a plasma temperature of 120 million °C for 101 seconds in an experiment in the first half of 2021. This time, steady-state plasma operation was sustained for 1,056 seconds at a temperature close to 70 million °C, laying a solid scientific and experimental foundation toward the running of a fusion reactor,” said ASIPP researcher and experiment head Gong Xianzu.

To keep all that plasma contained, the tokamak was built with materials that can withstand extremely high temperatures, like tungsten (W) and carbon (C). Thing is, even these materials would fail at the immense temperatures required by the plasma; to address this, the plasma itself is confined to a very small space, as far away from the walls of the tokamak as possible, using magnetic fields.

It is important to note, however, that EAST is not a nuclear fusion reactor; a tokamak can hold the plasma required to initiate nuclear fusion further down the line, but it in itself does not actually fuse hydrogen isotopes. That step will be part of future efforts to improve the results already displayed by EAST and its collaborators in the ITER project.

References

• 1,056 Seconds, another world record for EAST. (2021, December 31). Institute of Plasma Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences. http://english.ipp.cas.cn/syxw/202112/t20211231_295485.html
• Blain, L. (2022, January 5). Chinese tokamak keeps plasma 2.6 times as hot as the Sun for 17 minutes. New Atlas. https://newatlas.com/energy/asipp-east-tokamak-plasma-record/
• Starr, M. (2022, January 6). China’s ‘artificial sun’ just broke a major world record for plasma fusion. ScienceAlert. https://www.sciencealert.com/china-s-artificial-sun-just-broke-a-major-world-record-for-plasma-fusion
• Xinhua. (2021, December 31). Chinese ‘artificial sun’ sets new world record. China Daily. https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202112/31/WS61ceca11a310cdd39bc7e947.html