Nuclear fusion breaks through

Unexplainable

Vox

Life Sciences, Science, Natural Sciences

4.5 • 2K Ratings

🗓️ 14 December 2022

⏱️ 30 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Back in January, we spoke to a scientist at the National Ignition Facility about how close they were to achieving what’s been called “one of the most impressive scientific feats of the 21st century.” This week, they announced they’ve finally done it. A version of this episode originally ran on January 5, 2022. For more, go to http://vox.com/unexplainable It’s a great place to view show transcripts and read more about the topics on our show. Also, email us! [email protected] We read every email. Support Unexplainable by making a financial contribution to Vox! bit.ly/givepodcasts Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Okay, Umar Irfan, science reporter, Vox, hello, no.
0:05.2	We just got some huge news this week, all about nuclear fusion, which is this potentially
0:12.0	clean, almost limitless form of energy that scientists have been chasing for decades.
0:17.8	What's got everyone so excited?
0:19.4	We got this announcement from the National Ignition Facility, this laboratory in California,
0:24.8	that they finally managed to get more energy out of a fusion reaction than they put into
0:29.8	it.
0:30.8	Okay, this is a huge achievement for them.
0:33.0	This is the main threshold that they've been trying to reach for decades, and they
0:37.5	announced that they finally crossed that line.
0:40.0	It's the first time it has ever been done in a laboratory anywhere in the world.
0:48.0	We put this is one of the most impressive scientific feats of the 21st century.
0:55.6	Yeah.
0:56.6	When I saw this news, I was like, Umar, we did this episode of unexplainable earlier
1:00.6	this year, all about fusion and why this exact idea of getting more energy out than you
1:06.9	put in is such a big deal.
1:08.7	We don't only talked about this idea, we talked with a researcher at this exact laboratory,
1:12.9	and she told us that they were within striking distance.
1:16.2	They were just a few steps away from closing this gap, and of course, they were really jazz.
1:20.4	They were really excited.
1:21.8	They've been inching closer.
1:23.3	It's always seemed like it was always far away, but they actually managed to get over the
	...

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