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01-09-2014, 06:07 PM | #1 |
Hoodoo Guru
Join Date: Jul 2009
Posts: 286
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January 9th, 2014 -- The National Ignition Facility
The Atlantic's usually-awesome In Focus photoblog has a particularly stunning set of photos up today: 25 pics (spanning two decades) showing the construction of a piece of lab equipment to explore nuclear fusion.
The scale of the project is mind-blowing. A spherical chamber, 33 feet in diameter, houses lasers that, in total, can shoot up to a trillion watts at a target that is 2 millimeters in diameter. Doing this creates "[...t]emperatures of 100 million degrees and pressures extreme enough to compress the target to densities up to 100 times the density of lead." Seriously, just go look at the whole set. The captions are full of mind-blowing details about a project I never really even knew existed. Inside the 33-foot target chamber. The 2mm target. At the end of the pencil-like arm on the right is that 2mm sphere of hydrogen. |
01-09-2014, 08:26 PM | #2 |
The future is unwritten
Join Date: Oct 2002
Posts: 71,105
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Seems like a lot of trouble and expense to destroy a 2mm sphere of hydrogen, couldn't they hide it in an old Marlboro pack and shove down to the bottom of the trash?
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The descent of man ~ Nixon, Friedman, Reagan, Trump. |
01-10-2014, 05:30 AM | #3 |
Professor
Join Date: Oct 2006
Posts: 1,911
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Great IoTD gvidas!
I interviewed there right out'ta school. Got the whole tour. Living around there though...sucks. Hot, dusty, -1000 appeal. |
01-10-2014, 08:16 AM | #4 |
Romantic Necromancer
Join Date: Aug 2003
Location: Metro Detroit, Michigan
Posts: 29
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the big pencil
How do they sharpen that pencil in the bottom pic?
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01-10-2014, 09:40 AM | #5 | |
To shreds, you say?
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: in the house and on the street-how many, many feet we meet!
Posts: 18,449
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Quote:
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01-10-2014, 04:01 PM | #6 |
Goon Squad Leader
Join Date: Nov 2004
Location: Seattle
Posts: 27,063
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frickin' lasers!!!!
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Be Just and Fear Not. |
01-11-2014, 05:46 AM | #7 |
Professor
Join Date: Oct 2006
Posts: 1,911
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What's really nutz is trying to find out what's happening there NOW. Seems the place went black.
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