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Contenders in the Fusion Race • Mainline Fusion • Magnetic Confinement Fusion (MCF) • Inertial Confinement Fusion (ICF) • Other Fusion Concepts •

Magneto-Inertial Fusion and Rail Gun Fun at HyperV

Posted by DerekShannon on Feb 04, 2011 at 01:28 PM
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One of our New Jersey contacts is a fan of Virginia-based fusion research company HyperV. In place of an array of lasers like NIF or pneumatic pistons like General Fusion, HyperV plans to pump up the fusion power with an array of thirty miniature plasma rail guns—That’s the inertial part. Integration of a magnetic component further increases the confinement time. A plasma liner plays an important role, leading to the overall acronym PLMIF: Plasma liner driven magneto-inertial fusion.

As illustrated by the pretty ocean imagery on the HyperV website, the approach is geared towards deuterium and/or deuterium-tritium fusion, as opposed to advanced fusion fuels, but success there would of course remain a huge accomplishment. Some of the links on HyperV’s site are under construction, but the technical materials show a well-credentialed academic/industry team, a talk at the 2009 International Conference on Plasma Science, and a publication calculating gain from their design published in Physics of Plasmas. The work has also received funding from the DOE Office of Fusion Energy Science.

What do you think?

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