Research starts with PhD students

Chapter 245 A miracle happened! A major technological breakthrough!
Zhang Shuo, Xue Baikun, Wang Qiang and their group arrived at the experimental base in the evening.

In the experimental base, everyone is still busy preparing for tomorrow's experiment.

After Zhang Shuo arrived at the base, he met people from the Institute of Nuclear Physics including Tang Hua, Zhang Bingqing, and Wu Xiaodong, as well as Song Ruifei, Shao Enjiang and his group.

People at the Institute of Nuclear Physics are busy with experiments.

Song Ruifei, Shao Enjiang and his group were relatively free. They mainly came to observe the experiments and only participated in some incidental work.

Song Ruifei and Shao Enjiang followed Zhang Shuo and talked about tomorrow's experimental problems.

Song Ruifei was very interested in the internal modifications of the device. He asked many related questions, such as how the modifications were done, what the principles were, and so on.

In fact, he still didn't believe in the expected results of the experiment, but he just couldn't say it directly and clearly.

This small tokamak device is completely backward in terms of technology and materials. If it wants to maintain a temperature of 100 million degrees Celsius for more than ten seconds, it can be described in one word:

Very unscientific!

Zhang Shuo kept smiling, not caring what Song Ruifei asked, nor trying to guess what he was thinking.

He didn't care about these and just briefly introduced them, "We use mathematical methods to conduct scientific analysis of the internal structure."

"The most suitable structure can be found by calculating the high temperature and high pressure that each part of the structure will be subjected to."

“Every part will be calculated and designed in the most scientific way.”

"In fact, many of the internal structures of the original device are not perfect. We can maximize the average heat impact by changing the structure to increase the pressure-bearing capacity of the material..."

Zhang Shuo only gave a few brief introduction, but he revealed a lot of information.

Song Ruifei and Shao Enjiang understood it generally. When they thought about it carefully, they realized that structural design required a lot of calculations, and the calculations were very complicated.

This involves many aspects such as thermodynamics, fluid mechanics and materials science.

It's very late.

After Zhang Shuo asked about issues such as internal renovation, testing, and experimental preparation, he left to rest.

Song Ruifei, Shao Enjiang and his group also went to rest.

In the dormitory room.

Song Ruifei took off his shoes, put one leg on the bed, rubbed his leg and said, "Professor Zhang Shuo said a lot... Do you think it's possible?"

Shao Enjiang pursed his lips and thought for a while, then he scratched his hair and shook his head, "Who knows!"

"I don't understand those calculations either. Professor Zhang Shuo is the expert in this area."

"Don't worry about whether it's possible or not. Tomorrow is the experiment."

After he said that, he threw himself on the bed.

"You're right."

Song Ruifei sighed and muttered softly, "I kind of hope it's true, but I also feel..."

"Ugh!"

……

Early the next morning, the experimental base became busy again.

Everyone is looking forward to the experiment.

Tang Hua, Zhang Bingqing and the researchers involved in the experiment are all looking forward to its success.

They held their breath.

One reason is that Song Ruifei’s team obviously did not believe in the experiment.

They just came to see it because they were interested, and acted a little condescending.

Of course, they have a reason to be proud.

The artificial project team is the leading nuclear fusion tokamak device research team in China and even in the world. They have the world's most advanced talents, technologies and equipment.

The second is that the situation of those engaged in nuclear fusion research in the Institute of Nuclear Physics is actually a bit embarrassing, including Tang Hua.

This is mainly because there are no big funding projects on hand and their tokamak device is about to be eliminated.

As a researcher in physics, the scientific research environment is very important, otherwise it is impossible to do research.

Except, of course, theoretical physicists.

Now they are going to conduct experiments. If they are successful, doesn’t it mean that the technology they possess is better than that of the artificial sun team?
At that time, the artificial sun team will "learn from experience in reverse", and perhaps they will be able to apply for projects later.

The future can be looked forward to.

Many researchers were excited at the thought; they hoped for success more than Zhang Shuo, so they took the experiment very seriously.

Zhang Shuo is also looking forward to it.

He was not looking forward to the success of the experiment, but he was expecting that the success of the experiment would enable him to measure the strength value.

Now a lot of new detection equipment has been installed in the device, which will detect and feedback a lot of parameter data, so as to make calculations.

In fact, the strong value is a newly created evaluative value, and there is no such thing as a strong value in the physics world.

This requires a large amount of detection data for computational evaluation.

Every data is directly related to the strong force, such as the temperature and pressure of plasma.

The strong force value is not the reaction intensity, because reactions are different. The reaction formulas for deuterium-deuterium fusion and deuterium-tritium fusion are different, which involve changes in atomic nuclei, changes in nuclear force, and so on.

These are calculated values.

Zhang Shuo arrived at the large laboratory early. There were already many people inside. Some researchers only rested for a few hours and went back to work after waking up.

The experiment is expected to be carried out in the morning and preparations for ignition are now underway.

There are several ways to ignite a tokamak device, but they can all be understood as using external radiation for ignition.

This small tokamak device uses high-energy radio frequency waves for continuous heating, which is a type of 'slow ignition' technology.

'Slow ignition', the ignition speed is naturally very slow, and the energy utilization efficiency is very low. The advantage is that it is relatively stable and can allow the entire interior to be heated evenly, so that there will not be a situation where the temperature of one part is too high and the temperature of another part is too low, thereby maximizing the suppression of fluid instability.

Ignition will cause the temperature inside the reactor to continue to rise.

When a certain temperature is reached, the internal reaction will intensify, but the ignition will not stop. The so-called "lasting three seconds" means that the internal temperature reaches a critical line until the safety detection alarm sounds.

When the material is under too much pressure, or other faults may occur, the safety detection alarm will sound, the external heating will be interrupted instantly, and there will be neutron-absorbing materials inside to terminate the reaction instantly.

If the internal plasma temperature reaches 1 million degrees Celsius, the external high-energy radio frequency waves will also stop working.

1 million degrees Celsius is also the critical line for sustained autonomous reaction of deuterium-tritium fusion, which is equivalent to completing ignition.

The whole experimental process is not very risky because there is very little deuterium and tritium material in the reactor, and there are safety devices that forcibly interfere with the reaction, so the reaction will not become uncontrollable.

When the ignition began, Zhang Shuo and his team went to the control room.

Most of the people involved in the experiment are in the control room. After the preparation work is completed, the experimental operations are also controlled electronically.

There is a whole row of screens in the control room.

The researchers who participated in the experiment sat in front of a screen and performed the operations.

Zhang Shuo was standing in front of a side screen, which was a newly installed screen. The computer below could be used to view data, mainly checking the signals of several newly installed detection devices.

These testing devices are specifically used for strong numerical measurements.

On the other side, Song Ruifei, Shao Enjiang and Tang Hua were standing together, with a few people behind them, all staring at a number.

That large number is an estimate of the internal plasma temperature.

The numbers were rising, which also meant that the temperature of the plasma inside was rising. Someone shouted—

"We're almost at the critical line! Pay attention!"

Zhang Shuo walked over when he heard the shouting, and then stood back and stared at the numbers. For a moment, the control room fell silent.

Most people were staring at the temperature numbers, and as they saw the numbers reaching the critical line, they felt even more nervous.

When the temperature reaches the critical line, it also means that the internal reaction has become intense, "Here we go!"

"arrive!"

A few excited trembling voices made everyone even more nervous.

Many people were counting the seconds in their hearts, "one, two, three..."

"Three seconds!"

They suddenly became even more excited, because after three seconds it meant that the internal modification of the equipment was meaningful and directly increased the continuous control time.

However, time passed so quickly that they had no time to get excited.

"Eight, nine..."

"ten!"

"Ten seconds!"

“Hula~~~~”

It became noticeably noisier in front of the temperature counting screen, and many people couldn't help but shout out.

Song Ruifei and Shao Enjiang looked at each other in shock, but they didn't have time to say anything and looked back at the screen.

One second passed...

Another second.

Every second seemed to slow down, and every number that jumped on the screen made them more excited.

The temperature index rose to 100 million degrees Celsius!

At that moment, Song Ruifei and Shao Enjiang had the same expression. Their eyes were wide open and their half-open mouths were frozen.

Time seemed to pass as long as a century, and my mind became rigid. Finally, I heard a "tick, tick" sound in my ears.

The alarm has sounded!

The experiment is over!
"Whoo~~~"

Many people couldn't help but celebrate loudly while breathing a sigh of relief, "We succeeded!"

"14.54 seconds! 14.54 seconds!"

"It takes three and a half seconds to maintain 100 million degrees Celsius!"

"One word - cow!"

"Too good!"

"It's really... invincible! The last time was three years ago, right? It took less than three seconds then, but now it's more than ten seconds? And it's over 100 million degrees Celsius..."

"If I didn't know, I would have thought it was a large device. Only the artificial sun project can produce this kind of data..."

“I never thought that we could do it!”

"Did you see that? Nuclear fusion and tokamak still depend on our nuclear research institute!"

"Professor Zhang Shuo is amazing. He came up with a plan that can achieve this level..."

"I said yes!"

The reaction time lasted fourteen and a half seconds, which was far from impressive.

To an outsider, a duration of more than ten seconds may seem too short, but in fact, it is also very remarkable. A lot of data can be detected and fed back during the process, and a lot of research can be done based on it.

The test data alone is enough to support the writing of more than a dozen papers, which may even include groundbreaking discoveries and research.

At the same time, it is also very important that the temperature can exceed 100 million degrees Celsius.

During the experiment, the high temperature of 3.5 million degrees Celsius lasted for seconds.

This data is also remarkable.

The greatest achievement of the artificial sun project, that is, Song Ruifei's research group, is the realization of more than 400 seconds of steady-state long-pulse high-confinement mode plasma operation.

This is not the more than 1 seconds of stable operation of nuclear fusion, but a steady-state high-temperature plasma control technology, and the internal temperature does not reach million degrees Celsius.

The nature of the two studies is different.

In fact, the record for stable operation of ultra-high temperature nuclear fusion was created by a South Korean team. Their superconducting tokamak KSTAR device successfully heated the plasma loop to 1 million degrees Celsius and maintained it for a record 48 seconds.

This result broke the world record of 2021 seconds set by the device in 31.

Although the experiment lasted only 3.5 seconds, less than a fraction of the world record, the differences between the two experimental setups must be taken into consideration.

The equipment they use is so outdated that it is almost obsolete.

This kind of device can reach temperatures close to 100 million degrees Celsius, which can be described as a "miracle".

All the people involved in the experiment have enough reasons to cheer for the experimental results.

Amid the cheers in the control room, the people on Song Ruifei's team were also shocked to the extreme. Someone even shouted, "Awesome!"

"Too good!"

"Incredible! If I hadn't seen it for myself, I would never have believed it!"

Song Ruifei was also trembling with surprise.

Shao Enjiang was also very excited. Even though it was not his own research, the miracle was right before his eyes and the experimental results directly broke his cognition.

"It's really amazing, amazing..."

Shao Enjiang kept repeating, "It's just a small experiment, but it's definitely a miracle."

"This internal transformation is of great significance. It is a major technological breakthrough!"

"You've come to the right place. You've come to the right place!"

"Professor Zhang Shuo...you are worthy of being Professor Zhang Shuo!"

Song Ruifei and Shao Enjiang just felt convinced and had nothing to say.

Zhang Shuo was also very satisfied with the experimental results.

After everyone's excitement had calmed down a bit, he quickly gave instructions, "Let's start sorting out the data according to the plan!"

"Do the math and compare the strong values ​​with the experiments."

“It must be accurate!”

Everyone started working in an orderly manner.

The current working atmosphere is completely different from that before the experiment. Everyone is obviously very excited and very positive because the experiment has achieved significant results.

Many people can't help but talk about their experimental results after work.

Song Ruifei, Shao Enjiang and their group had nothing to do, so they were waiting for Zhang Shuo.

When Zhang Shuo was free, they would gather around him and keep asking, "Professor Zhang Shuo, how did you carry out this internal organizational transformation?"

"Is our project also possible?"

"With this modification, our equipment will be world-class in every aspect..."

"Absolutely!"

(End of this chapter)