An Artificial Sun Rising [View All]

[Dover]

Remember this? I was looking for an update, and thought I'd just post these stories again of various "artificial sun" projects:

Russians to Test Space Mirror As Giant Night Light for Earth
By WARREN E. LEARY
January 12, 1993

RUSSIAN scientists are planning soon to unfurl a glistening sheet of plastic in space as a first step toward testing an intriguing notion about turning night into day -- or at least twilight.

Tucked aboard a Progress cargo spacecraft attached to the Mir space station is an experiment called Znamya, or Banner, that will test the idea of using a mirror in space to reflect sunlight down to Earth.

If all goes as planned, the Banner payload will be deployed next month to unfurl into a 65-foot-diameter disk of aluminum-coated plastic film. The experiment will test the feasibility of illuminating points on Earth with light equivalent to that of several full moons.

Russian engineers say it should also teach them a lot about handling thin sheets of plastic in space, a step toward developing large sails to propel ships in space using the faint force of sunlight.

..snip..

The Sun is always shining somewhere on Earth, of course, if not always where people need or want it. But what if someone put a big reflector high in space to peer over the curvature of Earth, capture some of the Sun's rays and shine them down on the dark side?

In much the way a schoolchild playing with a hand mirror learns to reflect a spot of light from a bright window into the crannies of his room, some scientists believe they can put large, orbiting mirrors above Earth that could illuminate darkened areas below with spots of reflected sunlight that measure tens of miles across.

If it can be done, proponents say, providing sunshine at night could save billions of dollars each year in electrical lighting costs, extend twilight hours during planting and harvesting seasons to aid farmers, allow more working hours on large construction projects and help in rescue and recovery operations after natural disasters like earthquakes and hurricanes...cont'd

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F0CEFDF1630F931A25752C0A965958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all

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Artificial Sun
2003

LAST week major world and nuclear powers meeting in Washington took further steps, but encountered a major hurdle, along the road towards a dream project for a nuclear reactor or power-generation system based on fusion rather than the conventional fission-based power plants. The US, Canada, European Union, Russia, Japan, China and South Korea committed themselves firmly to the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor or ITER Project, the acronym being Latin for “the way”, which, at an estimated US 10 billion dollar (Rs 47000 crore) is the largest international collaborative research and development Project since the Space Station. But they also failed to decide upon where to locate the Project, the two main contenders being France and Japan, with geo-political considerations playing the main role in the postponement of this decision.

Before we discuss the various issues involved and their implications, let us first clarify some of the basics. Put simply, fission reactions are based on splitting atoms releasing huge quantities of energy as during the first nuclear bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Fusion reactions, on the other hand, are based on forcing the nuclei of atoms together releasing even greater amounts of energy, as in the Hydrogen Bomb but also, more commonly, as in the sun and the stars...cont'd

http://cpim.org/pd/2003/1228/12282003_snd.htm

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Creating "artificial sun"
26 January 2004


Scientists at the Federal Nuclear Centre in Sarov have succeeded in creating the most powerful magnetic field on Earth which allows to preserve energy equal to the Sun`s energy. World physicists are now working hard on the creation of the so-called artificial sun which will satisfy the planet`s demand in energy but only Russia has approached really close to making the discovery.

Area-24 is one of the secret testing grounds of the Federal Nuclear Centre. Something that still seems to be from the field of science fiction is being created far away from populated areas, among snow-covered forests. Under a crude awning is a system that has a magnetic field exceeding the magnetic field of the Earth 50m times. It is created using a powerful explosion. Viktor Selimer, director of scientific research centre of high energy density physics and directed flows of energy emission, All-Russian Scientific Research Institute of Experimental Physics tells:
- It is an explosive, an explosive substance comprising the 50:50 ratio of TNT and hexagon. For example, we were selling the system which you can see here to the USA for the price of Mercedes cars of 600 series. So, it is not that simple. The achievement of the Russian science is being guarded like the gold currency reserve, behind three perimeters of barbed wire. And the secret is made of bronze - only Russian scientists know how to wind correctly 4,800 coils on a reel in order to receive a superpowerful magnetic field.

cont'd


http://www.gateway2russia.com/st/art_186490.php

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China to Build World's 1st "Artificial Sun" Experimental Device
Jan/2006

A full superconducting experimental Tokamak fusion device, which aims to generate infinite, clean nuclear-fusion-based energy, will be built in March or April in Hefei, capital city of east China's Anhui Province.

Experiments with the advanced new device will start in July or August. If the experiments prove successful, China will become the first country in the world to build a full superconducting experimental Tokamak fusion device, nicknamed "artificial sun", experts said.

The project, dubbed EAST (experimental advanced superconducting Tokamak), is being undertaken by the Hefei-based Institute of Plasma Physics under the Chinese Academy of Sciences. It will require a total investment of nearly 300 million yuan (US$37 million), only one fifteenth to one twentieth the cost of similar devices being developed in the other parts of the world.

The new device will be an upgrade of China's first superconducting Tokamak device, dubbed HT-7, which was also built by the plasma physics institute, in partnership with Russia, in the early 1990s. HT-7 made China the fourth country in the world, after Russia, France and Japan, to have such a device...cont'd

http://www.china.org.cn/english/scitech/155948.htm

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Artificial Sun Unveiled
May 2006

The Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST) (formerly HT-7U), also known as "artificial sun", designed by the Institute of Plasma Physics, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, opened to the public recently.

Over 3,000 residents in Hefei City, capital of central China's Anhui Province went to the Science Island to have a close contact with the "artificial sun".

Most of the visitors were students. Some were primary and middle school students accompanied by their teachers and parents. Some were from local universities of science and technology. People experienced the charm of science as they were amazed at the power of modern science and technology.

..cont'd
http://www.china.org.cn/english/scitech/169184.htm

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New tests conducted on "artificial sun" (2007)


Chinese scientists have begun a new round of tests on the reliability of the experimental thermonuclear fusion reactor, nicknamed "the artificial sun".
The Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST) fusion reactor, which replicates the energy generating process of the sun, was tested at the Institute of Plasma Physics under the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) in Hefei, capital of east China's Anhui Province.

The reactor was first tested in September 2006. Since then scientists have made adjustments to improve results.

"The new tests show the reactor is very reliable, and we can repeat the experiments," said Wu Songtao, deputy director of the institute.

This new round of tests will continue till Feb. 10...cont'd

http://english.gov.cn/2007-01/15/content_496715.htm

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For the sake of China's "artificial sun"
2007

On March 19, 2006, the Chinese Academy of Sciences announced the ten most important developments in science and technology in China for 2006. The greatest breakthrough was the Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST), a superconducting non-circular section nuclear fusion experiment device built at the Hefei Institute of Plasma Physics, also known as an "artificial sun".

However, it is not widely known that scientists are endeavoring to build another tokamak at the Southwestern Institute of Physics (SIP) in Chengdu.

55 million degrees centigrade: the highest temperature on record

Past the Institute's central control room �C where there are dozens of computers �C in the fusion science experiment room, there is a giant device occupying two-thirds of the central space. The oval-shaped device looks like an upside down funnel, with several triangular "horns" stretching out from around the "funnel". It gives the overall impression of a huge five-pointed star. A red flag hangs on the front of the device. The poster beside it reads "China HL-2A".

One of China's major scientific projects, "China HL-2" is a "key component of future fusion reactors," said Yang Qingwei, director of the Office of Tokamak Experimentation and Diagnosis of SIP. It was in here that scientists generated the highest temperatures in Chinese history

http://english.people.com.cn/200703/21/eng20070321_359746.html

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Link to satellites launched:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_artificial_satellites_and_space_probes