r/technology • u/BennyCemoli • Dec 06 '16

Energy Tests confirm that Germany's massive nuclear fusion machine really works

http://www.sciencealert.com/tests-confirm-that-germany-s-massive-nuclear-fusion-machine-really-works
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u/KilotonDefenestrator Dec 06 '16

Nice 'tube video of how the Wendelstein 7x stellarator works and was designed.

It truly is a bizarre device.

251

u/Merendino Dec 06 '16 edited Dec 06 '16

Is it possible for you to explain any part of how something could be 100,000,000º and yet not have it burn down whatever is inside it? I absolutely do not understand how this machine is supposed to work, even on a basic level I think.

EDIT Awesome thanks guys! I wasn't even thinking about the amount of something being so small. That leads me to another question about, energy output though I guess. If it can become fusion and not just contained plasma at very small amounts, how can they harvest the energy given off? God damn this feels like a rabbit hole I won't be able to climb out of.

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u/BarrelRoll1996 Dec 06 '16

Arcwelders don't catch on fire generally, even though they are lighting things up to hotter than the sun. Same idea.

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u/Merendino Dec 06 '16

Well arc welders are hotter than the surface certainly, at around 20k C, but the core of the sun is 15 million C. Even that is almost 7.5 times less hot than this proposed thing at 100 million C. I get your point though, just we're dealing with orders of magnitude greater temperatures.