Zap Energy recently announced that its next generation device named the Fusion Z-pinch Experiment 3, or FuZE-3, has now achieved plasmas with electron pressures as high as 830 megapascals (MPa), or 1.6 gigapascals (GPa) total. This is comparable to the pressures found deep below Earth’s crust, and roughly 10,000 times the atmospheric pressure at sea level.
FuZE-3 is Zap’s first device to incorporate a third electrode to separate the forces that drive plasma acceleration and compression. Details of the preliminary results were presented at the American Physical Society’s Division of Plasma Physics. “There are some big changes in FuZE-3 compared to Zap’s previous systems and it’s great to see it perform this well so quickly out of the gate,” says Colin Adams, Head of Experimental Physics.
Unlocking energy from fusion requires an extreme recipe of hot, dense plasma. Reaching high pressures, a measurement that combines temperature with density, is essential in fusion because the higher the plasma pressure, the more fusion reactions occur and produce energy. While some fusion machines strive for the highest pressures that can possibly be attained, others rely on longer confinement times to make up for low pressure. Zap’s sheared-flow-stabilized Z pinches aim for a middle ground that balances both compression and confinement.
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