桑福德——当去年年底宣布核聚变点火成功时, 这消息震惊了整个世界. Headlines screamed on the front page of the New York Times: "A Blast of 192 Lasers Achieves a Breakthrough in Nuclear Fusion."

仅仅一个月之后, 《在线电子游戏网赌》栏目已经参观了实验室, conducted interviews and produced a television documentary segment for the long-running news show. "If fusion becomes commercial power one day, it would be endless and carbon-free," it began. 换句话说，它将改变人类的命运."

One of the scientists responsible for one of the world's great discoveries traveled to Sanford to discuss the breakthrough on April 25 at 中央卡罗莱纳社区学院. 70分钟的, 讲座由在线电子游戏网赌 STEM职业社区主办, one of seven areas of study created to bring together students with shared interests.

探索之路

Fusion reactions in nature provide the energy that powers our sun and the stars. 和聚变点火, 第一次在实验室里演示了什么, is the point when the reaction generates more energy than was required to create it.

Scientists have been researching fusion ignition for more than a century and working to achieve it for more than 60 years. 这条道路充满了障碍和失望, but the breakthrough moment finally arrived on December 5 in California at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

Dr. 智米. 廖是这一切的一部分. 他出生在中国，童年时移民美国, 廖 didn't know what he wanted to do with his life; in fact, 在高中的时候, he took a career-guidance assessment that suggested becoming an air traffic controller. But after enrolling in the University of Rochester and completing a junior-year summer internship at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, 他的未来变得清晰起来:激光光学.

最终，他获得了博士学位.D. in Optical Engineering and returned to the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, working 25 years as a laser physicist before shifting into his current role as workforce manager for the organization's National Ignition Facility and Photon Sciences Directorate.

廖在Dennis A. 柳条公民 & Conference Center with a short video summarizing the discovery before describing the chemical interaction. 在一个有三个足球场那么大的研究机构里工作, 科学家将192束激光聚焦在一个微小的目标上, sending the laser beams through a complex system that amplified their strength and even changed their geometry before finally striking a centimeter-sized, 发生化学反应的空心圆筒.

气缸内部, two different forms of hydrogen were forced together by extreme temperature and pressure, 它们的核融合在一起形成另一种化学元素, 在这个过程中, 释放能量. 多么极端? “它创造了一个温度高达1亿度的环境, 1000万度压力,廖谈到显微镜时说, 短暂的反应. “那比太阳中心还要热. 思考一下:当我们的激光被发射时, 我们是太阳系最热的地方. 包括太阳."

自20世纪50年代以来，人造核聚变一直存在, 但是什么让这一发现成为如此重要的突破, 廖说, 只花了2个吗.5兆焦耳的能量产生3.15兆焦耳的能量. 换句话说, 有史以来第一次, scientists showed how nuclear fusion could be used to generate energy in a process that could eventually be used to provide the world with unlimited amounts of clean power. (更不用说其他各种可能性了, like opening space travel over distances currently limited by how much fuel can be carried on board the spacecraft.)

成功是在经历了漫长而经常令人沮丧的过程之后取得的. 当科学家们朝着他们的终极目标前进时, 出现了必须克服的新障碍. 为了实现这一目标，十多年来进行了800多次实验, 甚至在那之前, lasers had to improve over many decades to produce the kind of energy required. “很多历史，很多失败，”廖说. “但每一次失败，你都在学习，克服，然后继续前进."

本地连接

廖 came to 中央卡罗莱纳社区学院 because of its Laser and Photonics Technology program, 这是东海岸唯一的一个. 根据学院网站, the program "teaches students how to control light and electrical energy to prepare them for careers in photonics and electronics engineering technology."

像所有的社区大学项目一样，激光项目以当地为重点. While most of its graduates end up working for local companies -- maybe as technicians or field service engineers in companies like Cree LED, Apex Semiconductors or Wolfspeed -- some talented graduates have migrated to the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, the federally-funded research and development center considered by many to be the world's best.

其中一位是布兰登·帕斯利, a 在线电子游戏网赌 graduate who worked in the control room as a member of the team directing those 192 laser beams in the historic fusion ignition experiment.

另一位是大卫·波普, who was working on a different "game-changing" laser project at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, but came back to Sanford with 廖 to participate in the presentation and handle some of the audience questions. Pope graduated from 在线电子游戏网赌 in 2016 with his Associate in Applied of Science degree in Laser and Photonics Technology. 几乎一毕业, 教皇说, 他收拾好他的丰田凯美瑞向西驶去, 他现在是那里的高级激光光电技术员.

在线电子游戏网赌's lead laser instructor Gary Beasley recalls Pope as an intensely dedicated student who already had a four-year degree before making a career change. “我认识他的祖父, who said he had a grandson who wanted to work in something hands-on and was interested in lasers,比斯利在演讲前的一次谈话中说. "He came into our laser laboratory one Saturday for a quick tour and immediately jumped all over it. 从一开始，他就表现出色."

这么多学生挤进了市政中心礼堂, one of the audience questions focused on how to become successful in the field. 廖和蒲柏轮流回答, agreeing that students need to be willing to learn -- especially from inevitable failures along the way -- and bring a strong foundational knowledge they can apply to problems they've never seen before. 因为, 正如廖所指出的, “我告诉人们的是，你在课堂上学到的东西, 当你来到实验室的时候, 那不是我们做的. We don't do exactly that, because what we do is not in the textbooks a lot of times .... 我们做别人不做的事情."

Pope said the path he began at 在线电子游戏网赌 was something he didn't know was possible or even existed near his North Carolina home. 但是那个周六的巡回赛和最终的职业转变已经改变了一切. “对我来说，”他说，“它彻底改变了我的生活."

了解更多关于在线电子游戏网赌激光器的信息 & 参观光子学技术项目 www.预备.edu/lasers.

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