Nuclear Fusion Explained by MIT Scientist

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GUEST BIO:
Dennis Whyte is a nuclear scientist at MIT and the director of the MIT Plasma Science and Fusion Center.

PODCAST INFO:

SOCIAL:

[LexClips]

Guest bio: Dennis Whyte is a nuclear scientist at MIT and the director of the MIT Plasma Science and Fusion Center.

[ishyandmikkischannel]

A comprehensive textbook used in graduate school is by Bittencourt, "Fundamentals of plasma physics." Fusion in the sun, and in tokamaks on the earth is different. In the sun, quantum tunneling is the reason fusion takes place. On earth, say like ITER in France, much higher temperatures are used to get what's called the "Lawson Criterion." And useful fusion is some multiple of the Lawson criterion.

In plasma physics courses at grad school almost no quantum mechanics is used. It is almost all classical E&M and statistical mechanics and resulting plasma dynamics.

Most people don't realise is that most of practical plasma physics doesn't need much of Quantum physics - even thought its based on it. The reason is that at those hot temperatures Maxwell-Boltzmann like distributions are all that matter.

And no one uses QFT, the field approach to particles, in plasma physics.

[OldBillOverHill]

I chose my second career as a power system operator. My first career was building the internet working for AT&T and its spin-offs. I worked with very small voltages changing in nano seconds from one state to another. Component level technology and I was the bed of nails test technician on the New Product Realization team. In the end I was testing custom software changes to Avay's flagship PBX. Learning about the grid and how the electromagnetic fields form a bond between the source and load and huge amounts of energy are stored as VARs. The grid is a complex system of discrete components just like the PBX's. Switch is much slower, and the magnitude of voltages are many times greater. EHV transmission lines are 500KV AC. The big DC tie between the NW and California is 1000KV DC using the earth as the ground return. The cables are huge and sunk into the ocean. Ironically, the SCADA systems are similar to the telecom systems I worked on though. My proficiency with computers was a great asset and I ended up coauthoring our training manual with a young woman that had three years of Cosmology at Boston College. We both have done well for college dropouts. 😜

[tombittikoffer]

Those Burke shows were absolutely the best. They give us so much to understand. My kids are really intrigued by them too.

[norvmath]

"It's a beautiful stroll" every bit of this statement is great.

[br]

I love at 14:45 how Lex said something so profound that most people never even think about, and the MIT guy was just like "yeah, yeah" but you could tell he had never thought about it either LOL. Freaking Lex man, got the universe on his mind. I like it! More people like this are needed in life. If everyone could be like that, then we would evolve as a society.

[beautruex]

2 units put in three out. It’s a very interesting start. Humans will possess fusion tech in 15-20 years.

[masamune]

The thing that I am still mulling and processing is how amazing it is that humans seem like the ”brain-cells” of the earth: not always well-meaning (just like all brain-cells…think alcohol…wonderfully positive…but past certain levels, massively negative), but also explains our role: the greatest cognitive and visual perception of ANY animal on earth, but more “Jack of all trades” and less “the best.” For instance, humans have the single greatest visual perception of ANY animal in history, but only judged fully. For instance, humans can’t see as far as eagles, but can process 8, 000 objects a second, versus an eagles’s 8 per second.

[juanozoresarriola]

Really interesting. I love these type of videos.

[TheRobeyRober]

This scientist has the overlooked talent of converting very complex information into smaller, understandable chunks of information, to educate people. I wish these sort of people got the attention that sports/reality stars get - the human race would advance so quickly as a result

[bugtusslealien]

The question here, does Lex have one black suit or two black suits?

[scottweedman]

What happens to that single neutron that's cast out when helium is created?

[tombittikoffer]

Thank you for getting back to knowledge and away from ignorance in your guests.

[franktkf]

I’m only here because I want to understand what Kurama was trying to explain to Naruto about Baryon mode 😂

[clipstv]

can you ask chat gpt if it wrote something?

[HomelessHomeowner]

We probably look like Indians rain dancing with out Nuclear Fusion to more advanced forms.

[WMFOREVERYOUNG]

So how does it work with Twin's 🤔 ?

[Bravetrain]

This guy says stuff he thinks is mind blowing and laughs too much at it.

[cokemachine]

Quit quoting Einstein, he didn't like that equation in the end .
Sounds like he describing the SAFIRE Project . Stars aren't what he thinks!!! Does he get a paycheck for this nonsense?

[thinkingbeyond]

Sad are ones, who reach enough answers to be beyond anything but one, insisting in fear of ridicule, yet defying principle science premise to acknowledge all evidentiary possibilities, as such by excluding nothing but one, God.