I am devoted to scientific research, but you want to trick me into having a love relationship?

Chapter 768 Qiankun No. 1, Ignition Again!

After the three-day holiday ended, Xu Qingzhou spent almost every day in the laboratory, closely monitoring the operation of various equipment.

10 month 12 day.

The atmosphere at the research institute was more tense than ever before, with a dedicated fire brigade on standby 24 hours a day and all researchers canceling their vacations.

Xu Qingzhou, wearing a white lab coat, entered the control room.

He only slept for 3 hours last night. After all the equipment was debugged, he went to his office to take a 40-minute nap and handed over the final testing to Academician Ren Nan.

"Ready?"

"Ah."

Ren Nan nodded in confirmation.

Actually, there wasn't much preparation. All the testing work has been completed in the past few days, and all that's needed is to perform the routine pre-ignition checks.

"Then let's get started."

Xu Qingzhou nodded, speaking in a deep voice.

As soon as he finished speaking, all the staff members immediately started their work.

"The ignition sequence of Qiankun-1 has been initiated. The negative triangular configuration magnetic field locking has been completed, and the plasma configuration stability is 99.9%."

"Liquid metal divertor thermal shield ready."

"Fuel injection complete—Qiankun-1 enters ignition countdown!"

Inside the control room, the researchers' reports were delivered in an orderly manner.

On the main control screen, strings of data flashed.

[Magnetic field preset --> | Negative triangular configuration locking | Superconducting magnet [Magnetic field strength 12.5T]]
Liquid metal divertor —> | Heat load preparation 50 MW/m | Target plate status [exposure rate 0%]
Fuel system → |Deuterium-tritium ratio 1:1|Injection complete】

At the control panel, Xu Qingzhou's eyes were fixed on a few screens, and all the data was developing in the direction predicted by his model.

"Core ignition successful! Ion temperature exceeds 150 million degrees Celsius, negative triangular configuration suppresses boundary turbulence efficiency of 99.7%—Qiankun-1 officially enters the high-confinement discharge stage!"

"Energy balance reversed! Continuous net energy gain detected - instantaneous output power 87 MW, exceeding input energy by 8.75%! Energy gain factor Q=1.09! Triple product exceeds 6.5×10 keV·s/m."

"Qiankun-1 operated with a net gain for 30 seconds."

"60 seconds."

"Net energy gain locked".

Southwest Institute of Nuclear Physics.

At 7 p.m., the last rays of the setting sun painted the clouds on the horizon red.

A car with "CTV" printed on it stopped, and four people got out at the door carrying large and small bags.

A girl with a high ponytail looked at the building across the street and said, "Is this one of our country's two major fusion physics research centers? It's so impressive."

"No, now it should be the three major fusion physics research centers, plus the Kyoto Institute for Materials Science."

The older brother carrying the camera corrected him from the side.

The young man wearing glasses clearly didn't know much about this, "but I've heard that the size of Qiankun-1 can't compare to that of Huanliu-3 and EAST."

The cameraman said with a smile, "Sometimes, size isn't the standard for measuring the sophistication of a device. I actually think Qiankun-1 has a lot of potential."

"This is my first time visiting a technology facility like this! Wow, Brother Li, that looks so futuristic!"

"Xiao Zhang, don't forget why you came here."

Seeing the girl chattering away, the female host in the lead gave her a helpless reminder.

"Oh, okay."

The girl suppressed her excitement, but her eyes still couldn't help glancing around. The group registered at the entrance and then, led by a staff member, headed into the research institute.

They came here specifically to interview Academician Zhang Zhigao, the person in charge of the Circulation 3 satellite.

The location was arranged in Zhang Zhigao's office.

The cameraman quickly set up the camera and the interview began.

Host: "Academician Zhang, we have noticed that the field of controlled nuclear fusion has been developing rapidly in recent years, and the competition seems to have reached a fever pitch. Could you tell us about the current situation?"

"Generally speaking, in the current international competitive landscape, I think we can roughly divide them into three tiers. The first tier consists of China, the United States, and Germany. These three countries are leading the way, but they have different focuses. my country mainly focuses on magnetic confinement tokamak, the United States focuses on inertial confinement tokamak, and Germany focuses on stellarator technology."

In addition to scientific missions, Zhang Zhigao has also been in charge of administrative work for many years and is well aware of the importance of public opinion.

"The second tier includes other European countries, Japan, South Korea, and others. They mainly focus on specialized cooperation, such as the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) and Japan's JT-60SA device."

"The third tier, including Russia, India, and other catching-up countries, although participating in the ITER division of labor, has seen slower progress in their independent projects."

Finally, Zhang Zhigao summarized, "Without a doubt, fusion research has entered a 'golden window of opportunity' and has entered the sprint stage of industrialization. The first fusion power plant is expected to be put into operation before 2030, more than 20 years ahead of schedule."

"As far as I know, the HL-3M has been undergoing upgrades recently. Could you give our viewers an update on its current status?"

"We have now completed it."

Time passes slowly.

After learning about HL-3M, the host moved on to the next question, "Qiankun-1 recently completed the triple product challenge and met Lawson's criterion. Some netizens predict that it will continue to bring us surprises. What are your thoughts on this?"

"Qiankun-1 is a typical spherical tokamak. People may not be familiar with the types of tokamak devices. In today's world, the mainstream devices are traditional types such as Tokamak-3 and EAST. Oh, and there is also ITER (International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor)."

"The core advantage of the spherical shape lies in 'compactness + high stability,' which simplifies engineering and reduces the volume to only one-tenth that of traditional controlled nuclear fusion, making miniaturization of fusion power plants possible. However, problems also arise."

"With its small size and limited magnetic field strength without a revolution in materials and technology, it is inherently impossible for it to compare with traditional tokamaks."

"Can we consider the spherical tokamak as a simplified version of the traditional tokamak?" the host asked.

"From some perspectives, you can think of it that way."

"Do you think spherical tokamak has potential?"

"Of course."

Zhang Zhigao was quite certain. After a slight pause, he changed the subject and said, "Spherical tokamak is a 'rising star' in the field of fusion, but its actual application still requires time to accumulate. In the short term, traditional tokamak will still dominate."

"The spherical tokamak still has a long way to go."

Zhang Zhigao spoke quite fluently.

The meaning is clear: Xu Qingzhou and his team's device has no future.

To be frank, it was targeted, but everything he said was based on data.

Is it wrong to speak frankly?

"Some outsiders estimate that the next experiment of Qiankun-1 will probably extend the duration of the triple product to more than 10 minutes. What do you think?"

"Research into controlled nuclear fusion cannot be accomplished overnight; even achieving 6 minutes is remarkable."

Zhang Zhigao smiled faintly.

Previously, the fusion triple peak was reached in 2 minutes.

Even if they go a bit crazy and increase it by 3 times, there's still a gap between them and us.

At that moment, the girl with the high ponytail came over and handed the tablet in her hand to the host.

The female host paused for a moment when she saw the message on the tablet.

(End of this chapter)