<story><title>Scientists Say Their Giant Laser Has Produced Nuclear Fusion</title><url>http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/02/12/275896094/scientists-say-their-giant-laser-has-produced-nuclear-fusion</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>Finster</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m on campus right now and can download the PDF. I&amp;#x27;d upload it, but I don&amp;#x27;t want to pull an Aaron Swartz. &amp;lt;_&amp;lt;&lt;p&gt;EDIT: Okay here, but I have limited bandwidth so get it while you can: &lt;a href=&quot;https://mega.co.nz/#!CNgVhZra!JcsLGB5y0FGUffI4rdyNr-BBl82YJDNH1ah3_4kSPcU&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;mega.co.nz&amp;#x2F;#!CNgVhZra!JcsLGB5y0FGUffI4rdyNr-BBl82YJD...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item><item><author>throwaway_yy2Di</author><text>Here&amp;#x27;s the paper.&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nature13008.html&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.nature.com&amp;#x2F;nature&amp;#x2F;journal&amp;#x2F;vaop&amp;#x2F;ncurrent&amp;#x2F;full&amp;#x2F;natu...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;They would like to charge you $32 to look at it, &lt;i&gt;nature&lt;/i&gt;-ally.&lt;p&gt;The fusion yield is (?) 14 kilojoules (inferring this from physicist Mark Herrman&amp;#x27;s &amp;quot;5 million billion fusions&amp;quot; [WaPo], at 18 MeV per fusion), which is a moderate improvement over the 8 kilojoule achivement from last fall:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6459289&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&amp;#x2F;item?id=6459289&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[WaPo] &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/fusion-energy-milestone-reported-by-california-scientists/2014/02/12/f511ed18-936b-11e3-84e1-27626c5ef5fb_story.html&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.washingtonpost.com&amp;#x2F;national&amp;#x2F;health-science&amp;#x2F;fusion...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;The &amp;quot;1%&amp;quot; energy efficiency figure [a] is misleading: 14 kJ is about 1% of 1.5 MJ of ultraviolet light hitting the fuel capsule. But creating that UV pulse consumed 3 MJ of infrared light, which in turn took 400 MJ from the flash bulbs driving the IR laser. So the system efficiency is more like 0.003% (and throwing in hypothetical turbines to generate electricity, 0.001%).&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Ignition_Facility#NIF_and_ICF&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;National_Ignition_Facility#NIF...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[a] I&amp;#x27;m referring to this: &lt;i&gt;&amp;quot;while more energy came from fusion than went into the hydrogen fuel, only about 1 percent of the laser&amp;#x27;s energy ever reached the fuel.&amp;quot;&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;(update: from yosyp&amp;#x27;s link, the fusion figures were 14.4 kJ, and 17.3 kJ, on two different runs:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7227950&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&amp;#x2F;item?id=7227950&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>suprgeek</author><text>Upvoted for the sentiment.
The actual paper marks just another incremental step in a triple marathon that we seem to be running veeeery slowly.&lt;p&gt;Also, if you do &amp;quot;pull an Aaron Schwartz&amp;quot; please change the ending - we need a very public Supreme court administered kick-in-the-teeth for all the out of control copyright regime and its criminal sentencing farce.</text></comment>
<story><title>Scientists Say Their Giant Laser Has Produced Nuclear Fusion</title><url>http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/02/12/275896094/scientists-say-their-giant-laser-has-produced-nuclear-fusion</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>Finster</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m on campus right now and can download the PDF. I&amp;#x27;d upload it, but I don&amp;#x27;t want to pull an Aaron Swartz. &amp;lt;_&amp;lt;&lt;p&gt;EDIT: Okay here, but I have limited bandwidth so get it while you can: &lt;a href=&quot;https://mega.co.nz/#!CNgVhZra!JcsLGB5y0FGUffI4rdyNr-BBl82YJDNH1ah3_4kSPcU&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;mega.co.nz&amp;#x2F;#!CNgVhZra!JcsLGB5y0FGUffI4rdyNr-BBl82YJD...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item><item><author>throwaway_yy2Di</author><text>Here&amp;#x27;s the paper.&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nature13008.html&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.nature.com&amp;#x2F;nature&amp;#x2F;journal&amp;#x2F;vaop&amp;#x2F;ncurrent&amp;#x2F;full&amp;#x2F;natu...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;They would like to charge you $32 to look at it, &lt;i&gt;nature&lt;/i&gt;-ally.&lt;p&gt;The fusion yield is (?) 14 kilojoules (inferring this from physicist Mark Herrman&amp;#x27;s &amp;quot;5 million billion fusions&amp;quot; [WaPo], at 18 MeV per fusion), which is a moderate improvement over the 8 kilojoule achivement from last fall:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6459289&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&amp;#x2F;item?id=6459289&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[WaPo] &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/fusion-energy-milestone-reported-by-california-scientists/2014/02/12/f511ed18-936b-11e3-84e1-27626c5ef5fb_story.html&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.washingtonpost.com&amp;#x2F;national&amp;#x2F;health-science&amp;#x2F;fusion...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;The &amp;quot;1%&amp;quot; energy efficiency figure [a] is misleading: 14 kJ is about 1% of 1.5 MJ of ultraviolet light hitting the fuel capsule. But creating that UV pulse consumed 3 MJ of infrared light, which in turn took 400 MJ from the flash bulbs driving the IR laser. So the system efficiency is more like 0.003% (and throwing in hypothetical turbines to generate electricity, 0.001%).&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Ignition_Facility#NIF_and_ICF&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;National_Ignition_Facility#NIF...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[a] I&amp;#x27;m referring to this: &lt;i&gt;&amp;quot;while more energy came from fusion than went into the hydrogen fuel, only about 1 percent of the laser&amp;#x27;s energy ever reached the fuel.&amp;quot;&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;(update: from yosyp&amp;#x27;s link, the fusion figures were 14.4 kJ, and 17.3 kJ, on two different runs:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7227950&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&amp;#x2F;item?id=7227950&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>TeMPOraL</author><text>They won&amp;#x27;t get after you because of one paper. Please, do it for the betterment of mankind :).</text></comment>