Among physicists, there is an old joke that fusion is 50 years away — and always will be.
That timeline may have shortened, though, thanks to a recent experiment at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, where scientists for the first time ignited a nuclear fusion reaction that produced more energy than went into it.
That breakthrough event ignited excitement in the world’s scientists as well. If humans can harness that power — the same power behind a universe of shining stars — then they may hold the key to clean, nearly limitless energy and arresting global climate change.
Read the feature article in the Spring 2023 issue of the Genesee Scene.