By Janessa Cloward
Scientists at UCLA successfully created nuclear fusion in a laboratory for the first time and may have opened the door for this technology as an energy source.
X-ray technology inspired the scientists to experiment with nuclear fusion, and they eventually harnessed the fusion technology in a laboratory, a task physicists have unsuccessfully attempted to do for decades.
Seth Putterman, who conducted the experiment at UCLA, said he got the idea for the experiment by thinking about how x-rays work and applying the same concepts to creating fusion.
?In the 1970s it was shown that heating crystals in an enclosure can accelerate electrons, and these electrons make x-rays,? he said. ?For fusion, you need to accelerate ions. We reasoned that if crystals can create enough of an electric field to create x-rays, why not fusion??
The experiment involved a tiny crystal enclosed in a chamber with deuterium gas, a form of hydrogen that can be fused. The crystal was heated on one side to create an electric field on the other. Putterman found as he heated the crystal, the atoms on the other side of it were ionized and accelerated, creating helium isotopes and neutrons, which are characteristics of fusion.
Several other attempts to create nuclear fusion have been made, but only one was significant. In 1989, two scientists at the University of Utah claimed to have created fusion in a laboratory, but their work was discredited when they could not recreate the experiment in future attempts.
For years, nuclear fusion has been hailed as the ideal energy source, but scientists never mastered the technology. Putterman said while his experiment may be a start towards harnessing fusion power, he has not discovered the key to making nuclear fusion practical for energy use.
Steve Jones, a physics professor at BYU, said the experiment is interesting and may help physicists learn how to use fusion for energy, but the method used at UCLA didn?t produce enough energy to be useful as a power source.
?This might be a way to get neutrons to fuse, but as far as creating energy, no, it is extremely unlikely,? Jones said. ?The fusion was too small by 100 trillion to heat one gram of water one degree Celsius, so no, this is not likely to be a new source of energy.?
However, there are potential uses for fusion besides energy. Putterman told the Associated Press he plans to focus future experiments on refining the fusion technology for commercial uses such as scanning luggage and cargo at the airport or drilling oil wells.
?What we have done is not useful for energy, but if other people have some ideas on how to expand on what we?ve done, that would be great,? Putterman said.