Novel design could help shed excess heat in next-generation fusion power plants
A class exercise at MIT, aided by industry researchers, has led to an innovative solution to one of the longstanding challenges facing the development of practical fusion power plants: how to get rid of excess heat that would cause structural damage to the plant.
The new solution was made possible by an innovative approach to compact fusion reactors, using high-temperature superconducting magnets. This method formed the basis for a massive new research program launched this year at MIT and the creation of an independent startup company to develop the concept. The new design, unlike that of typical fusion plants, would make it possible to open the device’s internal chamber and replace critical components; this capability is essential for the newly proposed heat-draining mechanism.
The new approach is detailed in a paper in the journal Fusion Engineering and Design, authored by Adam Kuang, a graduate student from that class, along with 14 other MIT students, engineers from Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratories and Commonwealth Fusion Systems, and Professor Dennis Whyte, director of MIT’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center, who taught the class.
Although we may be unaware of it (or choose to rebel against it) we tend to observe codes of pedestrian conduct – keeping to the right, passing on the left, respecting personal space and not barging straight through people. Now, engineers at MIT have designed an autonomous robot that can do the same.
In tests, the knee-high robot, which runs on wheels, managed to avoid colliding with pedestrians while keeping up with their pace. In order to allow the robot to plan its movement, the team fitted sensors, including a webcam, a depth sensor and a lidar sensor. The robot was trained using reinforcement learning, involving computer simulations, to identify the optimum path through a crowd.
Yu Fan “Steven” Chen, lead author of the study, commented, ‘Socially aware navigation is a central capability for mobile robots operating in environments that require frequent interactions with pedestrians […] For instance, small robots could operate on sidewalks for package and food delivery. Similarly, personal mobility devices could transport people in large, crowded spaces, such as shopping malls, airports, and hospitals.’
Details of the robot will be outlined in a paper presented at the IEEE Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems in September.
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Edith Keeler drops a massive hint early in City on the Edge of Forever that she’s going to turn out to be important to the future by being able to predict it.
She starts by saying that “soon, man is going to be able to harness incredible energies, maybe even the atom.” This is pretty prescient for 1930, considering the neutron would not be discovered until 1932 and the first nuclear fission reaction (splitting the atom) would not occur until 1934.
The basic theory behind extracting energy from the atom was already in existence, though; it comes from Einstein’s famous equation E = mc2, published in 1905, which states that mass and energy are equivalent. The mass, m, in an atom is tiny, but the speed of light, c, is large, so you get a lot of energy from a small amount of mass.
Keeler goes on to say that this nuclear power will one day be used in spaceships. There have indeed been nuclear powered space missions, including Voyager andNew Horizons, which were heading too far from the Sun to get sufficient power from solar panels. And if we’re ever to manage interstellar travel, nuclear fusion is one of the suggestions of how that might be done.
Her further predictions that nuclear power will be used to find ways to feed the hungry and cure diseases have also, alas, not come to pass.
Incidentally, the world’s first nuclear powered aircraft carrier was launched in 1960, just a few years before this episode was written. It was called the USS Enterprise.
“Enrico Fermi, the Italian-born Nobel Prize-winning physicist, directs and controls the first nuclear chain reaction in his laboratory beneath the bleachers of Stagg Field at the University of Chicago, ushering in the nuclear age. Upon successful completion of the experiment, a coded message was transmitted to President Roosevelt: “The Italian navigator has landed in the new world.”
Following on England’s Sir James Chadwick’s discovery of the neutron and the Curies’ production of artificial radioactivity, Fermi, a full-time professor of physics at the University of Florence, focused his work on producing radioactivity by manipulating the speed of neutrons derived from radioactive beryllium. Further similar experimentation with other elements, including uranium 92, produced new radioactive substances; Fermi’s colleagues believed he had created a new “transuranic” element with an atomic number of 93, the result of uranium 92 capturing a neuron while under bombardment, thus increasing its atomic weight. Fermi remained skeptical about his discovery, despite the enthusiasm of his fellow physicists. He became a believer in 1938, when he was awarded the Nobel Prize in physics for “his identification of new radioactive elements.” Although travel was restricted for men whose work was deemed vital to national security, Fermi was given permission to leave Italy and go to Sweden to receive his prize. He and his wife, Laura, who was Jewish, never returned; both feared and despised Mussolini’s fascist regime.
Fermi immigrated to New York City–Columbia University, specifically, where he recreated many of his experiments with Niels Bohr, the Danish-born physicist, who suggested the possibility of a nuclear chain reaction. Fermi and others saw the possible military applications of such an explosive power, and quickly composed a letter warning President Roosevelt of the perils of a German atomic bomb. The letter was signed and delivered to the president by Albert Einstein on October 11, 1939. The Manhattan Project, the American program to create its own atomic bomb, was the result.
It fell to Fermi to produce the first nuclear chain reaction, without which such a bomb was impossible. He created a jury-rigged laboratory with the necessary equipment, which he called an “atomic pile,” in a squash court in the basement of Stagg Field at the University of Chicago. With colleagues and other physicists looking on, Fermi produced the first self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction and the “new world” of nuclear power was born.”
This week in History: November 29, 1942 - Coffee rationing begins November 30, 1864 - Battle of Franklin, Tennessee December 1, 1955 - Rosa Parks ignites bus boycott December 2, 1777 - Philadelphia nurse Lydia Darragh overhears British plans to attack Washington’s army December 3, 1967 - First human heart transplant (1818- Illinois becomes the 21st state) December 4, 1783 - George Washington bids farewell to his officers December 5, 1933 - 21st amendment is ratified; Prohibition ends
“If the [nuclear] industry were a patient, doctors would privately refer to what’s happening to it as “circling the drain.” People don’t typically descend from perfect health to death in a smooth glide path. They rally, then they crater, then the cycle repeats. The good days become less frequent and less encouraging as days pass. If you’ve watched a hospital patient die, the pattern is unmistakable.
The U.S. nuclear industry is circling the drain. It’s suffering from a large number of problems—public disenchantment, risk of meltdown, fuel disposal issues—but its primary illness is simple economics. Nuclear cannot compete financially with other forms of electricity production. It hasn’t been able to do so for four decades, and there’s no reason to believe it ever will.”
I’ve finally started watching the Netflix series Meltdown at Three Mile Island.
I remember the news talking about this on my parents old Zenith TV back in 1979. As a kid I had no idea what or where this was happening. Nor did I have an idea of the seriousness that the events at the nuclear power plant could have for the East Coast of the United States.
Every online argument I see about nuclear power boils down to someone making an objection to the use of nuclear power, someone else responding with evidence that disproves the objection, and then the first person saying “Ok, maybe I was wrong about that, but my argument still stands because I still find nuclear energy Scary”
I will put these here and hope someone comes along to prove that we have a safe, non-genocidal way to dispose of nuclear waste.
I guess I just think the words “prove” and “disprove” are pretty strong. And this place in Finland will be, when it opens, the only permanent storage place in the world. I just think nuclear waste disposal needs to be sorted for every country that has nuclear plants. Maybe Finland will accept US waste—will we ship it across the ocean? How will we do that safely? And meanwhile there are still clearly problems with our temporary storage sites.
And this place in Finland will be, when it opens, the only permanent storage place in the world.
yes because anti-science “greens” have been sandbagging the Swedish effort to build a (more or less exact) copy for 20 years or something, and have been actively opposing similar projects in the US. like. the geological conditions you need are not that rare, and the amount of land needed is not large. you could fit all the nuclear waste the entire US industry has ever produced on a football field if you stacked it three or four stories high. maybe a couple more, but there’s just not that much of it on the grand scale of things. you can just build a few more Onkalo repositories.
“nature conservation” organisations are not nuclear technology experts and their credibility on these issues is the same as concerned mum groups on vaccines. just like those groups can dig up some crackpot doctor, the “greens” will dig up some crackpot geologists to support their FUD.
will we ship it across the ocean? How will we do that safely?
the swedes have a special-purpose ship for that. I don’t think it’s ocean-going, though. on the other hand, the US actually has… 80 ocean-going ships (ok, 69 of them would be called boats as they are subs…) that carry nuclear materials. they use it as fuel! you could probably load a couple dry casks on the USS John F Kennedy or something, it’s built to withstand being bombed.
and to be flippant. nuclear waste is really heavy. if the ship sinks it’ll just sit on the bottom. water is an excellent radiation shield – you can swim in a spent nuclear fuel pool and be less exposed to radiation than outside it because the water blocks cosmic radiation. now, compare that to what happens when a crude oil carrier has an incident…
And meanwhile there are still clearly problems with our temporary storage sites.
has anyone ever been hurt by US nuclear waste?
the swedes have a special-purpose ship for that. I don’t think it’s ocean-going, though.
The Sigrid is not the only nuclear waste carrier. Wikipedia lists 12 other ships built specifically for the purpose (that were active as of 2020), and a little further Wikipeding reveals several of them are oceangoing.
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