China's 'artificial sun' sets world record, achieves plasma temperature of 120 million °C

China’s Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST) broke the world record by achieving plasma temperature at 120 million Celsius for 101 seconds and 160 million Celsius for 20 seconds. As per the Global Times report, in a massive step towards the test run of the fusion reactor, the Tokamak devise located at the Hefei Institutes of Physical Science of the Chinese Academy of Sciences achieved the feet last week. The device is designed to replicate the nuclear fusion process that naturally occurs in the sun and stars that act as an infinite source of energy. The same can be obtained through controlled nuclear fusion, often dubbed "artificial sun."

China’s “artificial sun” achieving a plasma temperature of 120 degree Celsius broke the previous record of maintaining the temperature at 100 million C for 100 seconds. The Chinese state-run media quoted Li Miao, director of the physics department of the Southern University of Science and Technology in Shenzhen saying that it is a ‘milestone’ in reaching the ultimate goal of keeping a stable temperature level for a prolonged period of time.

Li told Global Times, “The breakthrough is significant progress, and the ultimate goal should be keeping the temperature at a stable level for a long time” while also adding that the next achievement might be to maintain the stability for over seven days or more. 

South Korea’s ‘artifical sun’ reached 100 million-mark

Since maintaining a high level of temperature such as 100 million degree Celsius is the key to any nuclear fusion reactions, in December 2020, the Korea Superconducting Tokamak Advanced Research (KSTAR) or Korean artificial sun has set the previous world record for successfully maintaining high-temperature plasma for 20 seconds with an ion temperature over 100 million degrees (Celcius). 

The Korea Institute of Fusion Energy achieved the milestone in joint research with Seoul National University and New York’s Columbia University which was successful in the continuous operation of plasma for 20 seconds in such a high temperature which is also one of the key conditions of nuclear fusion in the 2020 KSTAR Plasma Campaign, as reported by Phys.Org.

In November 2020, KSTAR or Korean artificial sun lit up for the highest amount of time that the plasma operation could continue. Last year, the plasma operation had lasted for only eight seconds and ended up doubling the time span in 2020. Further, two years ago the KSTAR reached the plasma ion temperature of 100 million degrees for the very first time and retention was reportedly only 1.5 seconds. 

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