17 minutes at 70 million degrees: China creates new nuclear fusion record

Chinese nuclear fusion researchers can really shine again at the end of last year. In the tokamak reactor EAST, a continuous temperature of almost 70 million degrees could be maintained for more than 17 minutes. A new world record.

Nuclear fusion is coming a few steps closer again

The “artificial sun”, nuclear fusion tamed on earth, is a dream that never seems to come true. No reason not to be happy about new water level reports from the scientific community.

The Institute for Plasma Physics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (ASIPP) has now announced a new world record for the pulse length in their experimental reactor. Just in time for the end of the year, the Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST) was able to maintain “continuous high-temperature plasma operation” for exactly 1,056 seconds – that is, well over 17 minutes. “The stable plasma operation was maintained for 1,056 seconds at a temperature of almost 70 million degrees Celsius,” said the scientist in charge of the experiments, Gong Xianzu, according to the Chinese news agency Xinhuanet. As the Institute for Plasma Physics in its publication writes, with reaching the new record, the aim is to explore the limits of the operation of tokamak reactors.

Everything for ITER

“In the past 15 years of operation, EAST has achieved plasma operation at 1 megampere, 160 million degrees and 1,056 seconds. With these milestones, a solid scientific and experimental basis has been created for research into fusion energy,” the researchers said proudly. In addition to an entry in the record books, EAST provides important findings with its experiments for the world’s most ambitious nuclear fusion project, ITER.