Nuclear Fusion

We get most of our energy from the Sun; there, the energy is converted by nuclear fusion.On the other hand, technology is not yet ready to carry out nuclear fusion on our own, right here on Earth - except for some experiments.

Fission more or less just happens. We can speed it up by increasing neutron flux, and even control the amount of speed-up by controlling the neutron flux using neutron absorbing materials. However, fusion doesn't occur at anything resembling normal conditions on Earth. We've got to produce tremendous temperatures and pressures to overcome the electrostatic repulsion between hydrogen nuclei and get them close enough together for the residual strong force to take over. When they do, it releases a large amount of energy, and it's hard to confine that. Currently the best I'm aware of that we've managed to do while still controlling the reaction is about 65% of input power (that is: for every 100 watts used heating and pressurizing and containing the thing, 65 watts of power were generated) and that only for an instant, but research is continuing and some people think it's possible.

Yes, the higher the heat and pressure the heaver the elements that can be fused (until nickel & iron are the products, then no additional amount of heat and pressure can cause more fusion).

The benefit of nuclear fusion is its potential to provide a virtually limitless and clean energy source with minimal environmental impact. One thing nuclear fission and nuclear fusion have in common is that they both involve the release of energy by altering the nuclei of atoms, although through different processes.

After nuclear fusion, the next steps for a star depend on its mass. For lower-mass stars like our Sun, the core contracts and heats up, triggering helium fusion. For higher-mass stars, a series of fusion reactions occur with progressively heavier elements until iron is produced in the core. Once iron is produced, the star may undergo a supernova explosion or collapse to form a neutron star or black hole.

No one currently uses nuclear fusion, as the technology has not yet been developed to actually put nuclear fusion into practical use.

The only place nuclear fusion is used on a large scale is in nuclear weapons...bombs.

We do not currently have the technical knowledge to produce controlled fusion reactors on a scale large enough to produce power. Right now, the only two viable uses of fusion are in the Sun, and in hydrogen bombs, but the latter is an uncontrolled reaction, not suited for use in a power plant.

The problem is that, in order to produce a fusion reaction, you need extremely high temperatures and pressures. That's easy for the Sun to do, because of its enormous mass and gravity, but on Earth it is a problem.

Once you have that fusion reaction going, then you need a way to contain it. Unfortunately, there is nothing that can hold the plasma needed for the fusion reaction, because it will burn through anything.

Since plasma is a charged stream, we can use magnetic fields to bottle it, so to speak, but in order to produce a strong enough magnetic field, we often need to use super-conducting magnets, which means very, very cold temperatures.

The conflict is that we need to maintain pressure and ultra high temperature in close proximity to super-cold temperatures. We just have not been able to accomplish that other than in very, very tiny experiments, with monstrously large machines.

Work is ongoing in various labs to attempt this, but I am going to guess that, without the benefit of some stupendous discovery, we are at least 50 or 100 years away from being able to sustain a controlled fusion reaction in a size sufficient to generate commercial power.

You would look for high-energy electromagnetic radiation like gamma rays emitted from the star. This type of radiation is produced during nuclear fusion reactions when light atomic nuclei combine to form heavier nuclei and release energy. Detection of gamma rays can provide evidence that nuclear fusion is taking place in the core of a star.

In the sun, and other stars, it is nuclear fusion which provides the power which enables life on earth to flourish. The nuclear reaction in the sun is called the proton-proton reaction, which produces helium and releases energy. This is promoted by the huge pressure at the sun's centre, and of course it started naturally, presumably as the sun attracted matter from space and gradually grew in size. The sun's reactions are at the core, and the energy spreads out so that the surface which we see is sending out light and infra-red radiation because it is incandescent.

On earth, in man made equipment, it is not possible to produce the conditions in the sun's core, and it is necessary to heat a gas plasma to much higher temperatures before fusion will occur. The power density in the sun's core is surprisingly low in fact, and to make a reaction chamber with those conditions it would have to be too large to be possible or economic. So for man made fusion the gas plasma has to be heated to hundreds of millions of degrees C, and the most promising way to do this is using magnetic confinement in a tokamak or torus shaped chamber. Plasma just means an ionised hot gas. Theoretically the reaction requiring the least energy to start it is between nuclei of deuterium and tritium (both hydrogen isotopes) and that is what is being experimented with. So far fusion has been produced but only for a fraction of a second (see JET in Wikipedia).

The end products of nuclear fusion in the sun are helium nuclei (alpha particles) and energy in the form of gamma rays and neutrinos. Four hydrogen nuclei combine to form one helium nucleus through a series of fusion reactions.

The process where an element of matter is changed into a completely different element is nuclear fission. In nuclear fission, a heavy nucleus splits into lighter nuclei, resulting in the formation of different elements. Nuclear fusion is the process where two light nuclei combine to form a heavier nucleus, while alpha decay is a type of radioactive decay where an alpha particle is emitted from a nucleus.

The critical temperature for nuclear fusion to occur in a star's core is around 10 million degrees Celsius. At this temperature, hydrogen atoms can overcome their mutual repulsion and fuse together to form helium, releasing energy in the process. This energy is what powers a star's shining and sustains its internal pressure against gravitational collapse.

No renewable energy power plant, or farm emits greenhouse gas. (Solar, hydro, wind, tidal, geothermal, biofuel or biomass).

Nuclear power stations, though not renewable, do not emit any greenhouse gases.

Iron is the most massive element that can be formed by nuclear fusion with the liberation of energy. This is because fusion reactions beyond iron require an input of energy rather than liberating energy.

In principle fusion should be better for the environment because it does not produce the active fission products. The snag is that it has not been made to work yet, and won't be for many years to come, so as a practical way of producing electricity it does not come into play, and we have to say fission is better than a non-existent fusion

A nuclear fusion reaction has the potential to produce large amounts of energy, far exceeding current nuclear fission reactions. It is estimated that a single fusion reaction could potentially yield millions of kilowatt-hours of energy. However, practical implementation and scaling of fusion as a viable energy source on a commercial scale is still a significant challenge.

core, where hydrogen atoms are fused to form helium atoms under immense pressure and temperature conditions. This process releases large amounts of energy in the form of light and heat, powering the Sun and enabling life on Earth.

When atoms combine they have to merge electron shells which causes them to become quite unstable and to break down and release massive ammounts of heat enery when is then used in power plants to heat up water to turn turbines

Nonrenewable, eventually the oceans will run out of extractable deuterium. But thatt probably won't happen for a few million years.

No, it is not an energy conversion as such. The fusion going on in the sun's inner region releases heat, which flows outward by radiation and convection. The outer layers of the sun reach a temperature of incandescence, around 6000 degC, and so radiate visible light as well as infra-red and ultra-violet EM radiation.

In nuclear physics and nuclear chemistry, nuclear fusionis the process by which multiple like-charged atomic nuclei join together to form a heavier nucleus. It is accompanied by the release or absorption of energy.

A reaction, as in fission, fusion, or radioactive decay, that alters the energy, composition, or structure of an atomic nucleus.

Tracking the progress of nuclear fusion as an energy source can be effectively done through reputable scientific journals, websites of research organizations like ITER or the National Ignition Facility, and attending conferences or webinars focused on nuclear fusion technology. Staying updated with official announcements and publications from organizations leading fusion research is key to monitoring its advancements.

Nuclear fusion is the process that powers stars, such as our sun.

During nuclear fusion, energy is released because some matter is converted into energy according to Einstein's famous equation E=mc^2. This means that a small amount of matter is converted into a large amount of energy, contributing to the immense power output of fusion reactions.