Skunk Works takes fusion in a new direction.....smaller

[Kulaf]

http://aviationweek.com/technology/skun ... or-details

Sounds really cool and feasible.

[Ddrak]

Interesting slant on it. Yes - fusion power is really cool and if it's developed by private industry then that company will rule the world.

Dd

[Embar Angylwrath]

For those of us a little longer in the teeth, isn't this a little bit of a dated concept? I thought non-tokamak magnetic field containment of fusion reactions was explored in the 90s, very similar to what is described in the article. I hope it does work, but it seems like a rehash of something already tried.

Full disclosure: I am not a nuclear physicist, but I did sleep in a Holiday Inn.

[Kulaf]

Yes, they admit that none of what they are doing is groundbreaking, other than melding about 5 different ideas into a new smaller concept. While every other project seems to be some huge undertaking, Slunk Works is working on a smaller more practical for everyday applications implementation.

[Arathena]

For those of us a little longer in the teeth, isn't this a little bit of a dated concept? I thought non-tokamak magnetic field containment of fusion reactions was explored in the 90s, very similar to what is described in the article. I hope it does work, but it seems like a rehash of something already tried.

Full disclosure: I am not a nuclear physicist, but I did sleep in a Holiday Inn.

The thing about fusion is that the physics doesn't change very much - the barriers that the old ideas faced aren't conceptual ones, but rather, they boil down to inadequate materials, inadequate sensors, inadequate controls, and inadequate ignition generation. As we advance in these areas and we get more and more data about the dynamics of a fusing plasma, we need to take periodic stabs at the old methods to see what they tell us.

That said, while we absolutely require fusion as energy generation, I'll get excited when they ignite a plasma.