In the predawn hours of Sept. 5, 2021, engineers achieved a major milestone in the labs of MIT’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center (PSFC), when a new type of magnet, made from high-temperature superconducting material, achieved a world-record magnetic field strength of 20 tesla for a large-scale magnet. That’s the intensity needed to build a fusion power plant that is expected to produce a net output of power and potentially usher in an era of virtually limitless power production.
The Plasma Science and Fusion Center and four collaborating organizations are working together to modernize fusion data for use with AI, increase accessibility to data, and diversify participation in fusion science.
“When I look up at the moon with my sweetheart, my wife of 48 years, I imagine that streaming from its dark side are electron holes that my students and I predicted and that we then discovered,” says Ian Hutchinson. “It’s quite sentimental to me.”
New five-year agreement will support SPARC science, increase graduate students and post-docs, and support interdisciplinary work towards fusion power plants
In a ceremony held on May 5, the team leaders for the Plasma Science and Fusion Center’s Toroidal Field Model Coil (TFMC) received 2022 MIT Infinite Mile Awards.
“One of the things that you get good at while at MIT,” says PSFC research scientist Sara Ferry, “is being able to start from nothing on a particular system or skill and knowing how to approach it in a way that’s effective.”
MIT research scientists Pablo Rodriguez-Fernandez and Nathan Howard predict the temperature and density profiles of a magnetically confined plasma via first-principles simulation of plasma turbulence.
As Martin Greenwald retires from the PSFC, he reflects on time at MIT, pursuing the question of how to make the carbon-free energy of fusion a reality.
On Sunday, September 5, 2021, a large-bore, high temperature superconducting magnet designed and built by CFS and MIT reached a field of 20 tesla. It paves the way to building SPARC and commercializing fusion energy. These are highlights from the Live-Streamed 20 Tesla HTS Magnet Demo Event
An animation of how the high temperature superconducting (HTS) fusion magnet built by MIT's Plasma Science and Fusion Center (PSFC) and Commonwealth Fusion Systems (CFS)was tested. Reaching a field of 20 tesla, it is the most powerful superconducting magnet in the world and a key technology in SPARC, a compact, high-field tokamak that will produce net energy from fusion.
On Sept. 5, 2021, for the first time, a large high-temperature superconducting electromagnet was ramped up to a field strength of 20 tesla, the most powerful magnetic field of its kind ever created on Earth. That successful demonstration by the PSFC and CFS helps resolve the greatest uncertainty in the quest to build the world’s first fusion power plant that can produce more power than it consumes.
After overseeing three years of research and development, Brian LaBombard is ready to test a toroidal field model coil (TFMC), a prototype for those that will be used in the new fusion experiment, SPARC.
MIT engineer, Vinny Fry is preparing to help test SPARC’s Toroidal Field Magnet Coil (TFMC), a scaled prototype for the HTS magnets that will surround the tokamak’s toroidal vacuum chamber to confine the plasma.
Since taking on course 22.63 (Principles of Fusion Engineering) over a decade ago Prof. Dennis Whyte has moved away from standard lectures, prodding the class to work collectively on “real world” issues. The course has been instrumental in guiding the real future of fusion at the PSFC.
MIT’s Erica Salazar shows that faster detection of thermal shifts can prevent disruptive quench events in the HTS magnets used in tokamak fusion devices.
Postdoctoral associate David Fischer's research focuses on observing ways irradiation damages the thin high-temperature superconductor tapes in the design of ARC, a fusion pilot plant concept.
This series of papers provides a high level of confidence in the plasma physics and the performance predictions for SPARC. No unexpected impediments or surprises have shown up, and the remaining challenges appear to be manageable. This sets a solid basis for the device’s operation once constructed, according to Martin Greenwald, Deputy Director of MIT PSFC.
As a graduate student Pablo Rodriguez-Fernandez (PhD’19) became intrigued by a fusion research mystery that had remained unsolved for 20 years. His novel observations and subsequent modeling helped provide the answer, earning him the 2019 Del Favero Thesis Prize.