A research group has taught AI to magnetically wrangle a high-powered stream of plasma used for fusion research — but wait! Put away your EMPs and
What happened
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Why it matters
The project is a collaboration between Google’s DeepMind and l’École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) started years ago when AI researchers from the former and fusion researchers from the latter met at a London hackathon. EPFL’s Federico Felici explained the problem his lab was having with plasma maintenance in his tokamak.
Such an everyday complaint! Yet it struck a chord with DeepMind and the two got to work.
Fusion research is conducted in many ways, but all of them involve plasmas formed at incredibly high temperatures — hundreds of millions of degrees. Sounds dangerous, and it is, but a tokamak is one way to keep it under control and allow close observation of the fusion activity happening within. It’s basically a torus or donut through which the superheated plasma travels in a circle, its path carefully constricted by magnetic fields.
This news brief is based on reporting published by TechCrunch on 2022-02-16. The original report is linked below.
TechCrunch
https://techcrunch.com/2022/02/16/ai-acquires-the-power-to-manipulate-fusion-but-wait-its-actually-good-news/This independent news brief is based on the public source identified above. It is an original summary or translation, not a reproduction of the source article. Rights in source text, research, trademarks and images remain with their respective owners; images are used under the licence or permission identified in the credit. Rights holders may contact rights@goodproductasia.com with evidence of ownership. Verified concerns will be corrected, replaced or removed promptly. This report is not investment, legal, medical or purchasing advice.
