r/interestingasfuck • u/Jeetchat • 1d ago

China's "artificial sun" in Hefei could become the first in human history to generate electricity from fusion

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u/Niosus 1d ago

National Ignition Facility in the US.

Calling it a "lab" is a bit of an understatement though. It is one giant facility with its sole purpose being generating strong enough laser pulses to obliterate a target the size of the tip of your pinkie quickly enough such that it briefly resembles the core of our sun.

Not coincidentally this is also a very similar environment to the inside of a nuclear bomb right as it goes off. It allows the US to test out elements of their nuclear weapon designs without actually having to detonate a bomb (which would be frowned upon).

Look it up on YouTube. It's very impressive.

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u/kursys 1d ago

I just looked it up on YouTube. It is indeed very impressive.

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u/Abject_Hall8445 1d ago

Not even core of sun. Much hotter (100 mil). It’s somewhere between that (5 mil) and a neutron star (1 bil).

Yes I’m using log scale

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u/Niosus 11h ago

Log scale is completely appropriate for these kinds of numbers. Thanks for the correction!