![]() ![]() The foundation of nuclear energy is harnessing the power of atoms by splitting apart, a process called fission, or combining them, called fusion. Inside the sun, fusion reactions take place at very high temperatures and enormous gravitational pressures. Look up during the day to see one of the most powerful examples of a nuclear reactor: the sun. Inside the sun, fusion reactions take place at very high temperatures and enormous gravitational pressures You can follow MATERIA on Facebook, X and Instagram, or sign up here to receive our weekly newsletter. Send your questions to or Twitter #nosotrasrespondemos. They are scientists and technologists, members of AMIT (Association of Women Researchers and Technologists), who answer these questions. We Respond is a weekly scientific consultation, sponsored by the Esteve Foundation and the L'Oréal-Unesco program 'For Women in Science', which answers readers' questions about science and technology. Question sent via email by Leonardo Arrabé Isabel García Cortés is a senior scientist at the Fusion Laboratory of the Center for Energy, Environmental and Technological Research (CIEMAT). Neither for the consumption of hydrogen nor for the emissions produced by fusion reactions, because in addition these emissions will not contain CO₂. The density is so low that no matter how many reactions occur with the release of helium, it can never alter the composition of the atmosphere. This means that there are very few particles. To give you an idea of the amount of material we need as fuel, in the plasma confinement machines we use for fusion experiments we have a density a million times less than the density of the air we breathe. Joining two hydrogens through the nuclear fusion reaction we obtain a helium and a surplus that is a neutron and is the one with a lot of energy. As I explained, we use the isotopes of hydrogen, which is the lightest element in nature, which is first in the periodic table, because it has only one proton and one electron. And you should know that we have started from very light elements. This mass difference (although almost negligible) has the ability to be transformed into energy by Einstein's famous equation E = mc². When they fuse, they form a new element whose mass weighs less than the sum of the masses of the initial nuclei. In the case of fusion we need to bring the nuclei closer together so that the nuclear forces come into play and attract each other strongly. In fusion, as also happens in fission, we speak of nuclear reactions, different from the processes we know of fuel burning, which are processes based on chemical reactions. scientists manage to repeat their success of generating energy through nuclear fusion ![]() It is an ionized gas that has more than one hundred million degrees of temperature. Plasma is the material used so that nuclei can fuse together and produce energy. A neutron and a lithium give as a product a tritium that will be used again as fuel in the plasma. And the tritium will be produced in the fusion reactor itself, since the neutrons from the fusion reactions impact a regenerative mantle composed, among other elements, of lithium. Deuterium is very abundant in seawater and will be obtained from there by hydrolysis. The fusion reactions that occur at a lower temperature are those produced between deuterium and tritium. This characteristic assumes that different isotopes of an element have the same chemical properties, but different physical properties. Isotopes are atoms of the same element (with equal numbers of electrons and protons), but with different numbers of neutrons. To achieve fusion reactors it will be necessary to use hydrogen isotopes. In addition, fusion is an energy that does not emit greenhouse gases. However massive the use of fusion energy may become in the future, its use (by the extraction of necessary materials or the emission of gases) will never be so great as to alter the composition of our atmosphere. It is the same as with fission, the process now used to produce energy in operating nuclear power plants, that the amount of fuel (uranium in this case) needed is very small compared to the fuel required by coal, gas or oil thermal power plants. In the same way, the Sun through fusion reactions is able to supply energy to the entire planet Earth. More specifically, one gram of fuel in the melting process has the potential to generate the equivalent of eight tons of oil. The great advantage of nuclear fusion is that, with a few grams of fuel, a large energy production can be obtained. ![]()
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