Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/744537
maltatoday, SUNDAY, 30 OCTOBER 2016 16 MATTHEW VELLA RESEARCHERS at the University of Malta are contributing to the construction of the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER), a €20 billion nu- clear fusion reactor known as a "tokamak". The reactor is being constructed in Cadarache, France, which will be the world's largest machine of its kind. The European Union, the United States, Russia, China, India, Japan and South Korea have all joined forces to build this experimental "magnetic confinement machine" that is set to prove the feasibility of nuclear fusion as a large-scale and carbon-free source of energy. "It is based on the same prin- ciple that powers our sun and stars," say the researchers at IT- ER. "ITER is designed to produce 'net energy and maintain fusion reactions for long periods of time. It will be the first fusion device to test integrated technologies, ma- terials and physics regimes neces- sary to build power plants for the commercial production of fusion- based electricity." The science is complex: ITER will fuse the hydrogen isotopes deuterium and tritium together. At extreme temperature, the en- ergy being added to the gas will create a plasma, which will then be confined in the shape of a ring or torus, inside a chamber con- taining very strong supercon- ducting magnets. Fusion is the energy source of the sun and stars. In the tremen- dous heat and gravity at the core of these stellar bodies, hydrogen nuclei collide and fuse into heav- ier, helium atoms to release tre- mendous amounts of energy. So by fusing deuterium and tritium, the reaction produces the highest energy gain at the "lowest" temperatures. But the conditions that must be fulfilled for this fusion include a very high temperature – 150 million degrees Celcius – and sufficient confinement time to hold the plasma, which tends to expand. "ITER is designed to make the long-awaited transition from experimental studies of plasma physics, to full-scale electricity- producing fusion power stations," researchers say. The first plasma is expected to be produced by 2025. Through a collaboration set up with the Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI) in Villigen Switzerland, Karl Buhagiar, Dr Ing. Nicholas Sam- News Malta scientists join effort to machine that will recreate Sun's