Reaching Ignition in the Tokamak

MAR 01, 1985

Research can continue the 20‐year trend toward greater plasma confinement times, densities and temperatures, leading to the full set of ignition parameters by the mid‐1990s.

DOI: 10.1063/1.2814490

Harold P. Furth

During the early 1930s, the study of nuclear fusion reactions was at the forefront of high‐energy physics. Fifty years later, the particle energies of interest in high‐energy research have outstripped those used in controlled fusion research by about eight orders of magnitude. on the other hand, frontline magnetic‐fusion devices such as the Tokamak Fusion Test Reactor at Princeton, shown in figure 1, and the Joint European Torus at Culham, England, will have luminosities of $10^{42} particles / {cm}^{2} \sec$ —some ten orders of magnitude beyond present‐day highenergy particle colliders. these numerical contrasts serve to highlight the very different goals of high‐energy physics and fusion research.

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More about the Authors

Harold P. Furth. Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory.