We Tried To Do Nuclear Fusion

[@CleoAbram]

Hey everyone! The goal of this video was to explore nuclear fusion by actually attempting it. I really appreciate the discussion around whether we achieved fusion-thank you! Science and education are always collaborative, and it’s one of my favorite parts of this community and my job. I care way more about getting it right than being right. So, as for whether we did fusion, after consulting with a few experts, here’s where I’m at: 1. After posting this video, I learned that the KZbin fusor community often considers direct measurement the standard for determining whether fusion was achieved, and I respect that. As you saw in the video, we didn’t directly measure fusion during our shoot. So, I’ve updated the title to “We Tried To Do Nuclear Fusion.” 2. The reason I felt comfortable saying “we did fusion” originally (and if asked now, I’d still bet “yes”) is that Helion conducted several tests with this same fusor setup. Based on those tests, plasma density measurements during our shoot, and standard theory, they calculated that a very very small number of fusion events likely occurred. They ran these trials in advance to make sure we had a safe shoot. If you’re interested in nerding out with me for a sec, here’s my understanding of those tests and why Helion feels confident, from a probabilistic perspective, about saying we did fusion: Higher voltage means ions gain more energy and move faster, increasing their chances of colliding and potentially fusing. At 50 kV, for example, per standard D-D fusion cross-sections, fusion events are more likely, though it’s not the minimum requirement. At 7 kV (our setup’s voltage), some fusion events were likely but at a very low, mostly undetectable rate. So, saying “we did fusion” is based on theoretical probability, but not direct measurement - and I’ve updated the title to reflect that. As some have noted, we wanted to keep any possible fusion rates extremely low so that radiation levels were below very safe limits as well. Most of all, I want to say thank you. Thank you for watching and reacting. Thank you for pushing. I can’t promise to be perfect but I can promise that I’ll always care more about getting it right for you than being right. I promise that I’ll work hard to make sure that everything we make is accurate, optimistic, and rigorous.

[@Matrix_TM.]

Is is suspicious that the CEO looks alot like doc oc 🤔😂 ( _cough cough_ *the power of the sun in my palm* )

[@nej.1190]

This comment is very refreshing. Cred to you for going back to this video, actually listening and correcting mistakes! A lot of creators wouldn't, it's nice to see that you really care about your viewers and what you platform.

[@abel3557]

Yeah this is just damage control. Your video makes it seem as if the pinchpoints of the plasma were fusion being visually noticeable. That is of course not the case Saying "I'd still call it fusion" is you just trying to save the video. You might as well have just gone to record a lightning storm and photographed lightning. There is a very small chance that a fusion reaction took place, but it's so insignificant and near in-detectable that it is irrelevant to even mention. That would have made for a better video than being fooled by the crud that the helion CEO spoutes.

[@RobertDidion]

thank you you are demonstrating the truth of positive reality and the multiverse and I thank you I love you

[@josebastardes]

If you are using deuterium as the fusion cell, one way to discover that you had fusion would be by using a neutron detector. In general, what I don't like about the whole industry talking commercial level is that not even the ITER project is being honest about their QT assessments. As of today, it is impossible to achieve commercial fusion because QT < QP in all experiments so far. Nonetheless, I believe someone will crack this one down soon. However, the industry needs to be honest and upfront about the actual reality of commercial viability. I am happy to see in your experiment, Helion CEO David Kirtley acknowledging the ongoing problem of the total energy output (QT) being smaller than the energy needed for the reaction to achieve commercial fusion. This technology is amazing! The more people working its challenges the sooner we can turn into a type 1 Civilization!

[@LeRoiJojo]

I like how David's completely unfazed by it all, like an electrical engineer who just showed a kid how to power a lightbulb with lemons or something.

[@wilurbean]

It is about that trivial Building a Fusor is a recipe now a days especially if you can stuff new. You can buy a nearly turn key drop unit for 10-15k

[@jafinch78]

Has anyone actually performed spectroscopy with their fusor? Seems like can be done really easy DIY by yourself. No fair, super tease.

[@paulmobleyscience]

Fusion fuel is Tritium/Deuterium, not just Deuterium. Naturally occuring Tritium is extremely rare on Earth and only found in trace amounts in the atmosphere. That means the Tritium in the expirement and the others came from our fission reactors. PWRs release 10s of thousands of TBq per site per year of tritium into the environment on a daily basis. This tritium is taken up in plantlife where it forms Organically Bound Tritium that does not leave the human body in under 30 days and becomes bonded to our cells that causes DNA strand breaks, micronucleus formations, cell necrosis or apoptosis, chromosomal aberrations and various other phenomena thus negatively affecting human health. We should not use either fusion or fission. Do these girls know this? Helium 3 is on the shortage list...

[@jafinch78]

​@@paulmobleyscience Yeah, so many people see the hype and rhetoric and not the holistic system develop and validation life cycle. Definitely many many variables not well detailed to the masses that makes me super bipolar like regarding the issue. Seems the first step is to clean up fission operations by getting those deep underground and/or underwater I guess and modularized with deep underground processing facilities to recycle and process the used materials. Holistically, there are excuses after excuse for dumbing down the U.S. Jurisdictions to complete morons en mass with low IQ's and EQ's and standardized logic memories and memory associations demonstrated in test scores that inhibit the advancement of the advanced domesticated complex maintenance of systems for growing populations societies. In particular the development of existing systems to be greener I guess is the term or healthier with the goals of the healthiest systems. That's not going to happen when the role models are a bunch of suicidal deviants hell bent on being hooked on a feeling and high on believing whatever is trending mafia lies and deceit for mass murdering profiteering schemes that are counter public health and counter public safety. Imminent threats are wild on the loose more than required, blending into the valid masses more than most realize intentionally. Doesn't serve or support the situation or valid design of what better men (and a few woman) intended to implement for perpetuity and betterment of humanity and society peacefully. Pan Troglodyte weird and alarming in many, if not most situations.

[@paulmobleyscience]

@@jafinch78 I don't believe deep underground is the answer and heres why. Dry casks....will have to be repeatedly replaced as the concrete and metal breakdown long before the waste reaches its whole life decay because half life does not mean safer by any stretch of the imagination. One radionuclide that went through one of its half-life and didn't decay has the same exact characteristics as a brand new radionuclide of the same name that just popped into existence. Meaning one tritium radionuclide that went 12.33 years and didn't decay has the same exact energy and characteristics as a brand new tritium radionuclide. You can't tell them apart...so we can't just bury it and forget about it in any repository. Using oil and gas type bore holes down to bedrock won't work either as we see issues with Microannulus and concrete degradation in the abandoned boreholes we have now which will create a path down to the bedrock for water to flow creating something the world has never seen. We shouldn't be drilling into bedrock causing weakpoints in what is normally solid and is not the answer. WIPP had an explosion simply because they used the wrong kitty litter. They all know it really shouldn't be buried and is not a plausible option for the storage of nuclear waste as it was their first idea over 70 years ago but found out what it will do to an aquifer if radioactivity and radiation gets inside. The only real answer as crazy as it sounds is to safely send it off this planet. With returning rockets and capsules that will protect astronauts in the case of a rocket explosion, this idea becomes more a viable option everyday, no matter the cost. We need to stop producing this waste before we finally figure out a viable way to dispose of it. Repositories are not the answer, nor is reprocessing it with something that end in EX (there are many) when we used to use hexafluoride to break the covalent bonds that seperates the fissle material from the wasted fuel.

[@thethoughtemporium]

Great video, but ya'll didn't make any fusion. If you had you'd all be suffering acute rad poisoning being that close to an unshielded fusor. That big glass window would be spewing xrays. Fusion doesn't happen until at least 30Kv, and the amount of current required is directly proportional to the size of the chamber. That massive chamber would be quite difficult to get up to actual fusion range. You'd probably need 50kv and a fair bit of current and it would be wildly unstable, fusing sporadically while spewing x rays. There's a whole community who've been building fusors for years and the standards for claiming fusion are really well defined. It's a "pics or it didn't happen" kinda thing. Basically, you need to detect actual neutron output or you can't claim fusion. This means you either need a bubble detector, a neutron detecting tube, or to activate some other element with the neutrons and detect the gamma decay of the resulting unstable element. It's a lovely build and I commend you on getting as far as you did, but David should know better and it's really disingenuous to make the claim of fusion in this context. I've literally built the same device out of microwave parts and jam jars and while it glows nicely, there's 0 detectable fusion at the voltages demo units like this run at.

[@SolkanStudiosTV]

Yeah I wasn't sure if I missed something but this did not look like fusion. I got detectable fusion back in October at 28kV and roughly 15mA and neutrons were detected on a Bubbletech BP-PND bubble detector as well as a calibrated Ludlum Neutron ball detector. The X-ray measurements infront of the glass viewport were higher than the meter provided by the university's radiation could handle and we did everything remotely. Also, pretty much all fusors' grids glow white hot at fusion power levels and their nixie tube plasma didn't come close to heating it. I'm not even sure what voltage they went to. If they went to 10kV or so you could say that they did get "some" fusion, relying on the fastest Deuterons in the energy distributions, but not even close to being able to detect it. Would anything like this pass as "fusion" on the fusor forums? Absolutely not.... but good effort and perhaps it'll motivate someone to pursue this line of work down the line.

[@ChrisTaylor-NEP]

I think David has just totally taken advantage of Cleo. He knows she comes across as an incredibly credible person, so this is just an opportunity for him to attract investors who just don't have the scientific skills to realize how difficult proper desktop fusion would be to achieve. I hope Cleo sees your comment and, for the sake of her own reputation, puts out a disclaimer that she was misled.

[@ooooneeee]

Yeah this is a startup doing pr on the backs of Simone and Cleo. sussy af.

[@LoveLearnShareGrow]

According to Wikipedia's entry on "Fusor", "With hydrogen fuels, about 3 to 10 keV is needed to allow the reaction to take place." In this video they use deuterium which is a hydrogen isotope. They mention running at 6000 V. So I think you're conflating calculated fusion conditions with detectable fusion emissions.

[@marcus_w0]

@@LoveLearnShareGrow He's not conflating - he points to the physical fact, that if there would be any atomic fusion reaction inside this MASSIVE chamber, the outcome would be an outburst of energy. And because entropy happens and it doesn't want to stay in that high energy state at all, there would be high energy emission - in form of massive amounts of x-ray radiation. This was nothing but a plasma reaction. A deuterium lightbulb or a glorified plasmaglobe. The procedure is working and all the aperture is capable of achieving a fusion reaction - but the seen outcome is not a true fusion.

[@HelionEnergy]

Cleo, when you suggested building a fusor to help people better understand fusion, we were all in! Thanks for coming up with such an awesome idea. And Simone, thanks for letting us send parts of a fusion machine to your workshop (twice 😅). This was so fun to build and really helps explain some fusion fundamentals.

[@jullit31]

It would be really cool if you had some way to detect the He in this kind of demo.

[@nathanbanks2354]

I've now subscribed to Helion.

[@aaronkoch3273]

Helion, it was badass for you to support them for this video. It's super cool to learn about stuff like this and it would normally be way out of reach for us "normies."

[@ultimateswarm7868]

@@jullit31 Replace the roughing pump with a helium leak detector, standard piece of vacuum equipment, would do the trick here. Would be cool to hear the tone change on the console as the amount of helium increases. One problem with this is that the pressure in the vacuum volume might be to high to provide the sensitivity necessary to detect it as the helium generation is likely very low. I'd love to see a video trying regardless!

[@ultimateswarm7868]

Please replace the roughing pump with a helium leak detector! Would be so cool to detect the increased presence of helium!

[@terramater]

Just today, Scientists at the Lawrence Livermore Laboratory in California celebrated a breakthrough in their fusion experiments. For the first time, they were able to generate more energy than they invested in the process. The researchers used 2.1 megajoules of energy, with the help of laser beams, to initiate the fusion of two hydrogen isotopes. The fusion reaction in the facility generated 2.5 megajoules of energy. This is an important step towards the commercial use of fusion technology and a potential alternative to fossil fuels.

[@afonso6372]

Uhhh that's hugeee*!!! *if true

[@slyhatjones]

Importantly, that's 2.1 megajoules stored in the lasers, but it takes huge amounts of energy to pump those lasers and they fire for a very brief amount of time and then shut down. The system as a whole still consumes far more energy than it outputs. That's not even accounting for the typical conversion of heat to electricity of maybe 50% efficiency. It's a significant step forward, but the journalism around fusion continues to gloss over the difference between net energy *of the reaction* vs. net energy *of the whole system*.

[@licencetoswill]

@@slyhatjones yes, but at least they've done the hard part. the rest is optimization in the support infrastructure, more efficient lasers etc.

[@pappaflammyboi5799]

No they didn't. They may have produced excess fusion energy from the laser input energy, but the system efficiency isn't even close.

[@slyhatjones]

@@licencetoswill I strongly disagree that that is "the hard part." It is like looking at successfully setting off some dynamite and declaring you are now close to building a power plant for years/decades that runs on dynamite explosions and produces electricity. What this latest step shows is only that using lasers is another approach to actually achieving fusion, e.g, tokamaks aren't the only approach in which the plasma fuses and heats itself up a bit. Firing lasers for a nanosecond and getting a tiny amount more heat than the fused material had originally + the heat of the lasers is a long way from making a reactor that runs continuously, much less one that has more electricity output than input.

[@darwinawardrecipient955]

Alternate title: Over Engineered Plasma Globe demonstration

[@nateeames6826]

Simone is such a natural fit for this channel. I hope we see her again!

[@jameshecht3471]

Get your hands outta your pants

[@Bigfoot_With_Internet_Access]

"The color you see is not pink, it's actually..." _Proceeds to define the color pink exactly_

[@EcceJack]

I guess... magenta (mix of blue and red) rather than pink (a pale red)? 😅

[@lloydevans2900]

He quite clearly describes the observed colour being a result of mixing two separate light sources, one red, the other blue. Meaning he is at least partially correct: Mixing these two colours makes purple, NOT pink. Having said that, some shades of pink can be difficult to distinguish from some shades of purple (depending on the mixture ratios of the light sources used), so the confusion is understandable.

[@emiloguechoons9030]

That really felt like he had a bruised ego and wanted to get the last word in, and now knowing that he's a scam artist taking advantage of Cleo and Simone in order to attract investors, it makes his seem like an utter creep tbh, also his vibes gives me the creeps

[@besmart]

This was so fun! And Simone is just the person to get this strapped onto a Delorean

[@flipclone]

she could strap it into her Truckla but I doubt it would fit in Cheese Louise

[@zapfanzapfan]

Fusion powered Truckla 🙂

[@noliver7913]

Ms. Fusion

[@soulofartorias9928]

@@noliver7913 @zapfanzapfan except there was no fusion in this video

[@earnbrand8536]

When you asked how you'd know that fusion had occurred, I'm surprised that David didn't pull out a portable neutron detector.

[@dsvilko]

Yeah, I was thinking the same thing. They should have used a neutron detector as you can have a nicely glowing ionized gas without achieving fusion.

[@daBuzzY90]

@@dsvilko And a lot of very damaging radiation. There was no fusion. Unless poor cleo and simone (and david!) now have to worry about having a much higher risk of dying of cancer.

[@ericresh3268]

If fusion occurred they would all be dead from x ray exposure. They looked at a pretty plasma cloud and that was all.

[@sapnamohta5986]

@@daBuzzY90Hey! I have very limited knowledge on this topic so this is just a curious question. Couldn't the radiation be inside the chamber, not released outside into the workshop, meaning that they actually achieved fusion while containing the radiation and neutrons?

[@james112680]

I'm just saying this in a nice way and not to be an evil comment jerk. I don't think this type of reaction releases neutrons. They take deuterium which is one proton and one neutron and fuse it with another set of those. And the final thing produced has the same particles. Maybe when it decays or something it'll release. But I have no idea. I also don't pretend like I'm an expert at everything like every KZbin commenter. And they would be okay with em radiation as well I believe. It's not dense enough of a reaction to cause any harm. So that's my response to the year old comment. Peace!!!

[@christiangodin5147]

Good day. Lovely video, but please do not pretend that you have realized a "fusion" nuclear reaction. It was a beautiful regular plasma creation.

[@maudado]

Beautiful colors! This would be a nice lamp for my living room!

[@TheSucram729]

That would be such a flex lol “Nice lamp. Where’d you get it?” “Oh from a fusion research facility. It’s performing nuclear fusion right now.”

[@gsant3204]

Probability it was nothing more than that, thy did not test to see if the reaction actually produced any Hellium, it looks like visual spectacle.

[@caffreyyy]

Absolutely!

[@BajkonurBobby]

@@gsant3204 5:36 12:20 Question, answer and confirmation. 🙂👍

[@Can_Head]

@@TheSucram729 "Hey nice lamp" "Yeah, it's powering my house right now"

[@Ajajqiqjaa]

the character arc from trying and actually doing it is giving me serotonin

[@Jetstream__]

Pun intended ;)

[@jeffknott1975]

Unfortunately this was not fusion, sorry to spoil it, they'd of got a fatal dose of neutron radiation, this guy knows this so unsure why he's lying on the video

[@austinplatt]

Not fusion really.

[@TheAverageDutchman]

I'm maybe being "that guy" but I just want to note, running a Turbo-Molecular Pump completely unconstrained and unsecured like that is a terrible idea if things go very wrong. There's a LOT of energy in that pump rotor (since it's running at a "mere" 20k to 40k RPM). If it catastrophically fails for whatever reason, it's going to go flying if it's not bolted down. It's really intended to be bolted down on every single bolthole on that front flange and in the case of a full lock-up (bearing failure) it will just about not shear off every single one of those bolts.

[@vigreene9849]

I would absolutely ADORE seeing this as like a travelling museum exhibit/program, like. being able to have an event where you could go and see fusion in person would be so deeply inspiring for so many youths

[@TheOfficialOriginalChad]

A bit pricey. It would be a lot easier to just create the plasma in the reactor and tell kids it’s fusion (because it might as well be)

[@jafinch78]

With at least a webcam spectrometer. Like Theremino or Les' Lab DIY design please. I want to see that done when using. Maybe can from the TV screen? 🙂 HHHmmm... I just thought about that and am now wondering.

[@genesisPiano]

Great idea!

[@Duckman1616]

@@TheOfficialOriginalChad That's actually what they did here.

[@uncopino]

so you can deceive even more people into thinking this is fusion?

[@revmatchtv]

This video absolutely did not show fusion. It showed plasma.

[@ArabGamer1733]

It saif “tried” in the title for a reason

[@revmatchtv]

@ The original title was “We did nuclear fusion” She changed it a few days ago.

[@Ftoforwca]

@@revmatchtvHow do you know this, a lot of people actually working with it (or at least say they do says it’s true. And you are giving us no reason why it ain’t true so can you provide a reason why you think there were no fusion?

[@revmatchtv]

@Ftoforwca Fusion temperatures are incredibly high. 100M C according to many sources. That means it must be contained so that does not touch a material such as glass or metal. If it touches something; it will be instantly vaporized. To prevent that extremely powerful magnetic fields are used to contain it. No glass viewing window is possible.

[@abel3557]

​@FtoforwcaNobody that does nuclear fusion research would say the glorified plasma was fusion.

[@NorthernChev]

You definitely did NOT "make fusion" with that device, right there that day. You made plasma, that's it. Nothing more; and he knows this. You've been intentionally mislead. Period.

[@tusharbhudia9421]

It's unfortunate, the news also make this mistake all the time too.

[@tylergriffiths8432]

But the guy just said they did fusion though ?

[@NorthernChev]

@@tylergriffiths8432 LOL. I know, right?

[@tylergriffiths8432]

@@NorthernChev How do you know they didn't create a fusion reaction? Unless I missed something in the video. Many people are saying what you said

[@dreadtrain2846]

@@tylergriffiths8432 They would all have cancer, among other things.

[@thehandler-555]

Big, if true. Did you really fuse deuterium? D + D → 3He + n You'd feel the effects of neutron radiation by now.

[@aerostorm_]

To answer your 7 month old comment, they never achieved fusion here. Its just a glorified D burner creating mundane plasma. This company is just attempting to attract funding through social platforms drawing interest.

[@flightsimdev]

No, Sorry if that guy is saying you made fusion he is lying to you, you might have made the steps toward it, but you didn't actually do it, and if you did, you had no radiation protection, gamma rays are lethal, and you being that close would be an extreme heath hazard.

[@mannyalejo772]

A neutron detector would have confirmed the fusion reaction.

[@PavloPravdiukov]

it would also confirm the disturbing truth about fusion being highly radioactive. If only there was an expert on fusion to explain those dangers...

[@26kuba05]

@@PavloPravdiukov The expert in the room knew them well that there was no fusion and was there for free PR and promotion.

[@26kuba05]

@@okaraaze1087 iirc what you see in the video is only plasma glowing and no fusion happening. With actual fusion you would get ionizing radiation and you aren't supposed to be close to that shit. Helion CEO wasn't bothered by radiation because there was none because there was no fusion.

[@26kuba05]

​@@okaraaze1087 I don't do fusion but my educated guess would be that plasma temperature was too low. I think geiger counter should be enough to prove fusion. Idk what exactly they did wrong

[@lawabidingcitizen5153]

@@PavloPravdiukov It outputs radiation, that doesn't mean it*s radioactive though, both the starting materials and the products are harmless, it*s only what happens inbetween

[@aaronhhill]

I just read yesterday that the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California have finally achieved a net energy gain from a fusion reaction.

[@ty-lercox]

What does this mean exactly? Does this mean they could scale their current solution large enough to power a city? (Ignoring any additional breakthroughs)

[@aaronhhill]

@@ty-lercox That's the rumor.

[@osmia]

This reads as a perpetual motion machine to me. Almost made me check the current date to see if it was April 1

[@dkaloger5720]

Yup , true .They are due to make formal announcements December 13

[@jasonberry2026]

No, not yet. There is still the need to extract the energy and only after this step (including losses) has greater than nett zero does it mean time to scale up and industrialise. That's why @davidkirtley and the guys at Helion are so important as their design Co siders the direct electricity energy extraction in the fundamental design, ie Helium 3

[@danielwoods7325]

Whoever is organising PR for Helion is doing a fantastic job - this is FOURTH youtube video I’ve seen them on in the last month. Can’t wait for Polaris!

[@mynameisjeff.]

He's a con artist. It is not scientifically possible his system to ever produce more energy than it consumes. No fusion occurred here. He is a complete fraud.

[@clax5612]

Bot actt

[@carogpt]

I can't tell you how cool it was to see two women absolutely STOKED to create fusion in a workshop. I don't think anything like this was ever even thought of as part of my education growing up in science and I wonder how many younger viewers are going to be incredibly inspired to jump into this due to videos in this series. Well done Cleo and Simone! :)

[@Tesseract9630]

So are you saying if men did it , it wouldn't be cooler and inspiring?

[@DForce26]

Look! it's an Andrew Tate fan in the comments... 🤣

[@carogpt]

@@Tesseract9630 Not necessarily! However, only 4.4% of nuclear scientists are women it's pretty cool to see women exploring such a niche field of science featured so prominently, even if they are simply learning about the topic. I understand if the emotional argument of this may be a bit surprising or unfamiliar to you, but if you look at this statistically, it is pretty unusual for women to be featured in this space and I think it's cool to have them featured here. It's okay if we have different opinions, but here's mine. Yes, I think it is cooler to me to have women exploring nuclear tech because they are statistically over 90% less likely to do so and because I, as a woman growing up, was not encouraged to explore the sciences. Now, if you're a dude, maybe it's more cool for you to have a male scientist building nuclear fusor's but for me it's a combo of emotional significance AND statistical intrigue and I think that's pretty valid. What do you think?

[@Tesseract9630]

@@DForce26 why are you so upset in in giving equal treatment to men

[@DForce26]

@@Tesseract9630 Wait? I'm upset? 🤣

[@jamesraymond4682]

How could Kirtley say they had fusion at 6 kV? This makes Helion look bad

[@Tayfaan]

Nice job! I have a question though, the viewports are a major source of xrays and in the system we're building for a high school project, we are required to use cameras in order to view the reaction. I was wondering why this was not a concern in this system? What was the used voltage? What was the pressure of the chamber when filled with deuterium? If you ever read this, thank you so much :)

[@natev7870]

There were probably no x-rays because there was no fusion. According to other sources I've heard the voltage used here is nowhere near high enough so it's most likely just a plasma bottle

[@lawabidingcitizen5153]

@@natev7870 That would mean that x-rays are the only thing to worry about, but at the voltage they used its so soft that little could penetrate the glass

[@IcECreAm-sv2qv]

@@lawabidingcitizen5153did your class ever get the fusion experiment finished?

[@ScottWaa]

The joy between you and Simone is absolutely contagious! So inspiring!

[@keshavjha8482]

Love the Atom song dance! Cleo has great company and it makes me happy to see people love their job and enjoy the moment 😊

[@aritano491]

It is pretty cool to see the plasma through the window, but the fact is that if that really was a fusion reaction you would probably have cancer or worse because of the neutrons produced. That glass is not stopping anything.

[@thesavage2054]

Not only was it great to see Fusion is Simone's workshop it was even better watching two great friends get so excited about it 😊

[@MissionMan]

I watched this right after reading about an article about The National Ignition Facility successfully creating fusion that created more energy than it took to make! That's incredible! It's also great to combine that knowledge with this more hands-on (hands off?) fusion at a smaller scale to wrap my head around it more.

[@greaser3069]

I love how all the comments pointing out that this isn’t fusion are completely overlooked. I find it funny how the people who really understand whats going on get ignored. There is no fusion. Still cool though

[@teresashinkansen9402]

Where are the neutrons? this is just an overly expensive and complicated discharge light, this is not a reactor until there is proof of a neutron flux.

[@connorogilvie3642]

I love how this came out literally a day before the most significant breakthrough in fusion technology history

[@BiologicalComputer]

It didnt

[@af0ulwind115]

The idea of fusion is to coheres multiple atoms to become a singular atom. this can be done through collision or through gently manipulating the orbitals and the gaps between electrons of one atom to coincide with the orbitals and the alignment of the other atom's electrons, at which point the repulsion between atoms is reduced greatly if not completely, and the nuclei are permitted to come within the electron sphere of each other. If done properly one could conceivably coax many thousands of atoms into the same volume of a single atom without intense heat or fast collisions. your central sphere as seen in this project, induces too many contradictory paths of electromagnetic ripples and is a major hinderance to the process. to improve cohesion, I would recommend building six out/input feed loops, (such as found in a magnetron) in a configuration that they do not touch each other, but they form a directional electron flow in a somewhat (S orbital) pattern. think six circles with an opening in each one, the current enters the positive lead and exits the negative lead making a single loop that is interrupted by the gap between the leads. each of these loops will come into the chamber from a different side. none will touch another. but it will appear as if you formed a cube out of circles. the current that you feed into the lines needs to be adjustable, therefore a rheostat or variac will be necessary for dialing the voltage in and out to get a proper reaction. for this experiment you will want high voltage, and high Hertz, high amperage... may not be necessary. You will, for best results want the housing of your vacuum chamber to have a highly Paramagnetic property so as to duplicate the moving magnetic waves inside the chamber pushing them back toward the center, likewise reducing the amount of plasma that comes in contact with the walls.. I am rather interested in many aspects of physics and do not believe most understand that reality they are trying to describe with the current analysis and application of mathematics to the design of particle structure and the universe at broad.

[@BirthquakeRecords]

9:56 I love how Simone is having a full blown Color Out of Space moment here

[@BirthquakeRecords]

(I’ve actually not seen this movie, just the trailer - I hope this reference makes sense, and isn’t somehow a messed up thing to say)

[@KevinCSmith-ue8ck]

My favorite part of this video, and all of Cleo’s videos, is the sheer excitement and joy of it all.

[@generischerkanal]

4:10 that is not right. You would fuse deuterium with deuterium into helium 3 and a neutron or into tritium and a proton. The d+d->he4 reaction is kinematically pretty much impossible, unless you have another nucleus close-by to offload momentum onto. Also in general, im am unsure how I feel about these collabs Helion energy has with content creators (there was another video recently with real engineering). In my opinion, Helion is a borderline scam, which these content creators cannot properly judge of course, given their lack of knowledge in the area. Still, it feels a bit off, they shouldnt be promoting something they dont understand. Speaking as a fusion enthusiast and physics student, who has taken some fusion research and plasma phyiscs courses.

[@DehimVerveen]

I don't know much about fusion and plasma physics, but this video did make me a bit more sceptical about Helion energy. Particularly because of neutron radiation and they also did not verify whether fusion was actually happening. Are these concerns valid? Could you elaborate on Helion being a scam? I've been seeing a lot of videos about Helion recently where it seems like a very promising technology with potential and to a layman like me it makes sense that it could work, but I would also like to hear the other side of the story.

[@generischerkanal]

@@DehimVerveen Well, what Helion Energy is trying to do is Helium3-Deuterium fusion, unlike pretty much anyone else out there including serious research institutions like JET, NIF, and hopefully, some time soon, ITER, who are all trying to do Tritium-Deuterium fusion. He3-D fusion is much harder than DT fusion, requiring Temperatures about three times higher (which translates to thermal radiation losses 81 times higher), as well as Helium 3, which only occurs naturally in minute quantities, so they want to create it artificially whith Deuterium-Deuterium fusion, which is even harder to get to break even. So doing He3-D fusion is like wanting to run a marathon when you cannot yet even walk. A useful (not all-powerful, but useful) measure of how close a reactor is to energy breakeven is the triple product of temperature, confinement time and density (or pressure in some formulations, those are proxies for one another). Helion does not publish the triple product it reaches (which is a massive red flag), but from what you can cobble together (e.g. the size of their capacitor banks) they only manage confinement for at max a couple hundred microseconds, which is just way too short (ITER is going for something on the order of seconds), temperatures of a couple keV, which is still off by a factor 5 or so and density is fundamentally capped by magnetic field strength. Since they wont be going anywhere near the 13 Tesla field of ITER, there is no way they will get a decent density either. Then there is the very concept itself. Field-reversed configuarations have large ion gyroradii, which means just a couple collisions are enough to diffuse through the magnetic field, which means, bad confinement, probably much shorter than even the short time for which their fields are up and running. In short, they would probably have to improve the performance of their device by 3 orders of magnitude (which I reckon is not even remotely possible) just to get to the level where Tokamaks (JET, ITER) are. And then, toss in another factor 10 (its more, really, but who cares at this point) for added dificulty due to He3-D fusion, to get to viability. In short, there is no freaking way they can make it work. They are just pulling in money from gullible silicon-vally types by making dazzling claims, with no substance behind it.

[@viewspan]

​@@generischerkanalThanks for writing that. Something I don't understand is that they plan to have it unshielded in Microsoft datacenters. I get that the DD reaction to produce the helium 3 will be done elsewhere, shielded, but in the D+3He generator unshielded in Azure, won't the deuterium react with itself, producing neutrons that would harm the operators? Or is there another reaction that cancels the effects?

[@generischerkanal]

@@viewspan No, you are correct. DD has two reaction routes, one of which releases high-energy neutrons, the other one of which releases tritium, which in turn reacts much more readily with the deuterium than the helium, releasing super-high-energy neutrons. Definitely not safe outside a heavily shielded reactor.

[@willcookmakeup]

10:56 "be the even crazier friend that asks" wow. I don't think she even meant for that quote to land so hard

[@JanStrojil]

Glad to see you both survived! ❤️

[@wspepsilon]

So... I've seen a few interviews now with Dave and helion but this, this was my favorite! The fact that he was chill enough to take time out of his schedule to help build this backyard reactor for all of us to geek out over! That's the kind of CEO I want to work with right there...

[@runforitman]

Great, just what we need A source of distrust around fusion. This will definitely be beneficial to our future.

[@ThatMakesSenseToMe]

Very few videos re-ignite my pure childlike wonder at science. This was such a gift. Thank you both for all your work. 💜

[@Mikeztarp]

There's something poetic about doing a _collab_ about _fusion._

[@creepervideo1106]

Hahaha

[@Thawney]

I can’t believe the timing of this video!! Also it’s such a lovely video thank you

[@SignalDitch]

This was an excellent video! 1) Damn, think you got a big enough turbo? 2) Congrats on really underplaying how scary it was to lose power while pumped down. I don't know what your vacuum circuit looked like, but turbos really don't like to leak up fast. 3) The shots of Simone and Cleo with their faces against the viewport, aside from looking like kids at christmas, was giving me real Shoe Fluoroscope vibes. I know you didn't run it long, but how conscious were you of the x-ray and neutron radiation you were producing? Did you manage it mostly by managing the energy of the reactor or did you just limit your exposure? Did you wave a gamma scout around while it was fusing, just for fun? Again, thanks for the awesome demo! I've seen a lot of Farnsworth fusors on YT but the presentation here is top-notch!

[@trollasaurus269]

They weren’t worried because there was no fusion. He has access to every type of neutron detector available. He knew well there was no risk of X-rays from ionizing gas

[@uncopino]

no x-rays to worry about because there was no fusion

[@lorenzbilbo]

"Wait, it was there! It was there!" Needs to be in every intro from now on. Perfectly expresses many of the firsts we experience in life that we are designed to seek, enjoy and ruminate on. Great job! Almost as iconic as, "I reject your reality and insert my own!." IYKYK.

[@AstroKobi]

Such a great video!

[@swarajtilekar3836]

Wow ur here

[@oddlang687]

Just saw a video from polymathy talking about how at LLNL they were able to produce a net energy gain from nuclear fusion for the first time and then that led me to this video! Super cool stuff! And yeah, I'm jealous that you were able to do nuclear fusion in Simone's workshop

[@gorilaz0n]

Simone and you definitely have great chemistry! You two should partner up for more videos!

[@ralfkruse7565]

Maybe you should try cold fusion. FLEISCHMANN and PONSE did it some 30years ago at the MIT. They got 4times more energy out than they put in. Italian engineer ROSSI could get 15 times bigger output. (only heat energy,) 😎🇫🇷

[@AMTunLimited]

Can we pause for a moment and appreciate David's Doc Ock cosplay? Guy looks astoundingly like a young Alfred Molina

[@luishsteuer1660]

You made a plasma chamber. Did you actually sustain fusion reactions? They are not the same.

[@Dr.K.626]

Hi Cleo! Thank you for your wonderful explanations. I'm a college professor and CEO. In both roles, your videos have been highly useful to explain concepts and explain my vision. I owe you!!

[@Skunkhunt_42]

Made a fancy neon light

[@howitzer13b]

As they are building a nuclear fusion reactor and turn it on… “Are these good sounds?” The “Observer” with the knowledge says…. “Yes these are good sounds.”

[@matgggg55]

Nice job! I just want to point out to some people commenting a demo fusion reactor can be achieved even easier than this. This set up you guys build is fairly robust! That turbo pump is huge and so is the chamber. It’s fitting for your propose to make the set up big so it’s easy to video but you can achieve the same thing using much cheaper and smaller equipment. I built mine for about $3,000 using a much smaller chamber, a diffusion pump instead of turbo pump and a cell that turns heavy water into deuterium gas. A basic fusion reaction is amazingly easy to achieve at home. The hard part is actually acquiring the knowledge to know how to do so. Useful information on building high vacuum systems is sadly hard to find.

[@MarianKeller]

Yea, the turbo pump must have been one they had lying around, totally oversized for the way it's connected to the chamber.

[@matgggg55]

@@MarianKeller yes especially how they have it connected, the literal definition of a bottle neck lol

[@MWFchaos731]

Just found your channel. Of course you have a video with Simone! I’ve been subscribed to her channel for awhile. She has a very bright mind and able to see what most of us can’t.

[@AlwinMao]

The farnsworth fusor, developed in the 60s, relies on the fact that 4000 Volts is a voltage commonly found in neon signs and CRT televisions but equates to a temperature of 45 million Kelvin, 3x that of the center of the Sun.

[@grimson248]

3:03 "I think it looks great... but I also don't know what I'm doing" this describes me in so many levels.

[@TheIceThorn]

That's just plasma generation, not actual fusion... if it were fusion you would have just have had a neutron shower...

[@johnchessant3012]

Wow, incredible timing of this video given that the first net-gain nuclear fusion reaction was just achieved at Livermore labs (results are going to be announced tomorrow)

[@MECKENICALROBOT]

I love Simone so much for this statement … *“let’s be humble for just **_a little longer…_** I’ll tell you when we can stop being humble ;)”*

[@juanca1991]

I couldn't help but cry from pure happiness when I saw Simone's glowing face mesmerized by fusion. Thank you for being so truly and deeply happy even when so many things had happen to you. You're pure light and make people like me appreciate life more and not take any great moment for granted.

[@RobertBretsnajdr]

❤

[@imomedvidek]

now imagine, how would their faces be glowing if there was actual fusion happening

[@AndrewPonti]

I felt like I was watching the warp core from Star Trek! That was unreal - like CGI but actually happened! I hope these 2 do more together!

[@lukaswerner4390]

The timing OMG especially with today's announcement from the Department of Energy

[@ihavenousernameideal]

I know lol

[@itsdavidmora]

Cleo: "We don't know what we're doing here" Simone: "Speak for yourself" True.

[@valdabezouska]

They should be glad they’ve not made fusion (if you don’t count just absolutely negligible non-zero amount, made through sheer probability) with their heads 10 centimeters from “fusion reactor” with piece of glass as their only protection 🙃 I’d argue that this is just fusor, basicaly cooler plasma lamp

[@bosskaur2206]

im so happy to see that no one was serious about the science fact but all of them played and enjoyed! hilariously wow i love these people!

[@y_social_]

The story that has sent shivers down my spine since I was a kid are the ones where the world told them it was impossible, and they just up and did it anyways. Congrats Helion and team. May your efforts be fruitful.

[@MattMajcan]

okay i keep hearing all this stuff about fusion but ive never actually just seen it so clearly, this is amazingly beautiful

[@dismayer666]

Fusion my ass. It's a nice looking toy, but there was no fusion. You just made some plasma, that's all.

[@AreaCode000]

"Be the even crazier friend that asks". Words to live by!

[@pedrobroek2228]

This isn’t fusion btw, these are merely the conditions under which a sustained fusion reaction could be made but even with this “test” only about one in a trillion particles at most would collide and fuse so no you didn’t make a fusion reactor, only a plasma chamber

[@abel3557]

Yep. They might as well have gone and recorded lightning strikes and said they "did" fusion.

[@jlbarrera]

Cleo, I so love your channel… please continue creating content, your content is so interesting! All explained in English, and all of your content is inspiring Congratulations!! And please, keep creating! You’re the best!!! And thank you for making me smarter every day!!

[@PocketProjects]

This was posted a day before it became global news?? it's fair to say you guys just predicted the future! Hmmm I have a hunch Cleo and Simone you've just travelled back in your timemachine that you completed next year😆

[@kvtechvarshney5179]

The most fascinating thing is u can't do fusion in your garage coz it requires radioactive material. But u can do fusion in your garage, a process which produces much more energy than fission! And not just that it produces more energy than fission but it produces more energy than any process that produces energy on this earth, and u did that in your garage, so amazing!

[@josephpugh1331]

Absolutely zero fusion happened during this video.

[@chrisp3858]

7:15 I know the sound of turbos spinning down fast and it's always a bad sign but i love it especially when you know how fast they spinning

[@luis_discovery]

And two days later someone announces they’ve achieved fusion with positive energy output 😄 Like David was saying, lets hope we’re able to upscale the process for real energy production in the next decade!

[@Sven_Dongle]

Except no, they didnt. Actual power input to the 192 LASERs was around ~200 MJ, power on target was ~2 MJ after losses, extracted energy was ~3MJ final, so it adds up to a huge deficit in total.

[@mikestienen6064]

I love this video, I work for a company in the vacuum space and it is disappointing to see so little companies use vacuum in their video's. (I get it, it is hard to make a video about nothing). The setup looked good only thing is that it used viton o-ring instead of metal seal (cf copper flanges). I know metal sealed isn't necessary for these kind of levels of vacuum but it cool to go as low as possible in my opinion.

[@TheAlchaemist]

Nice Farnsworth fusor. It is sad that in this case with such a setup, fusion was not actually achieved nor tested, neither it was explained why you cannot be happily watching through the window when neutrons are massively exiting the chamber in all directions... as such it is just a publicity stunt and a stain in what would have been a beautiful learning experience.

[@trevorkorber]

Just to add on to the part of the pink, fuchsia, magenta colour portion. The reason the colour only looks like that pink but actually isn’t is just as he said it’s producing blue and red light which our eyes has receptors for. And if you look in the Center between red and blue on the visible colour spectrum the colour in the middle is green. So logic would suggest we would perceive it as green. However our eyes actually have green receptors too which aren’t being triggered so our brain actually realised ‘wait this isn’t green tho’ so it creates a whole new colour of which we perceive as magenta. Which is why magenta technically doesn’t exist and is an illusion. Correct me if I’m wrong in any of these statements this was from the top of my head from what I remember

[@mrdan2898]

No YOU did not do Nuclear Fusion!!!! But still Cool experiment!

[@hudsonserwanga]

Cleo, I really really love your work, the excitement before Watching your videos is just so outstanding. Keep up your good work, I am your number one fan

[@HAL9000.]

And the "Perfectly Timed Video of the Year" award goes to. . . . CLEO!

[@askbatguy]

I'm ever so grateful for Simone and her half of his video for introducing me to the world of cleo abram 🙏🙏

[@geirthieussbimkravahl]

This guy is to fusion physics what chiropractors are to science based modern medicine. He’s a quack. He’s the next Trevor Milton. No, you did not do fusion.

[@roshanjohn4308]

The timing of this video is so spot on. Currently ;) the total current generated was less than the total current needed to generate but today it seems they achieved scientific energy breakdown! That is insane! I was smiling like a kid seeing that fusion like how you two were enjoying it. Really loved it! What I would have done to be part of something like this.. It was sooo beautiful

[@pacify11]

This is so coool 💯

[@MrNobody6311]

This video was uploaded 8 mins ago. How tf you did comment one day ago 👀👀

[@keshavjha8482]

Were you part of the filming crew?

[@foxylovelace2679]

There is nothing more wholesome than wide smiles and screaming in delight at seeing a wonder of science happening before your eyes. That is just 10/10 food for the soul.

[@FFSK734]

With only 6kV, there was no fusion. It is bullshit

[@aaroncampbell113]

As a dude that builds mass spectrometers, this seems really similar, down to the 'pink fire' as we call it. You absolutely can tell how happy a vacuum chamber is by the sound the pump makes...

[@jekanyika]

I don't think fusion occurred.

[@ComputerGeekOnTwoWheels]

Simone is too cool. Does everyone know that Simone built the first Tesla truck in her garage and called it Tuckla? Now all that is left is for her to put the fusion reactor, aka Mr. Fusion, on her Tesla truck.

[@tomgraham2688]

I think you mean fiction not fusion

[@N0N0111]

I just love how Helion is so down to earth and sharing the love on tech/science channels. Go Helion you guys and gals will make the future bright for many of us.

[@Mobin92]

Shaking my head at this nonsense... It's a grift by David All they did here is basically a fancy neon lamp.

[@siddhantkumar6340]

Your video timing is brilliant, I saw the last video and understood fusion and by the release of this video they have already found a way to produce energy efficiently from it

[@jonathanwood5033]

Completely lost respect for your channel after this video... If you can't get this right then what's the point of watching anything else you put out?

[@ryanakers1372]

LOL, I think we witnessed Simone's villian origin, "The power of the sun, on the worktable of my shop!" That is really cool, though.

[@alacastersoi8265]

bruh they all have cancer if they did fusion