Lifeboat Foundation

In 1960, visionary physicist Freeman Dyson proposed that an advanced alien civilization would someday quit fooling around with kindergarten-level stuff like wind turbines and nuclear reactors and finally go big, completely enclosing their home star to capture as much solar energy as they possibly could. They would then go on to use that enormous amount of energy to mine bitcoin, make funny videos on social media, delve into the deepest mysteries of the Universe, and enjoy the bounties of their energy-rich civilization.

But what if the alien civilization was… us? What if we decided to build a Dyson sphere around our sun? Could we do it? How much energy would it cost us to rearrange our solar system, and how long would it take to get our investment back? Before we put too much thought into whether humanity is capable of this amazing feat, even theoretically, we should decide if it’s worth the effort. Can we actually achieve a net gain in energy by building a Dyson sphere?

Anti-social bookworm Henry Bemis (Burgess Meredith) suffers a cruel twist of fate as he finds himself in a nuclear wasteland without his reading glasses. Check back each Thursday for more Twilight Zone Classic videos. Stream The Twilight Zone on CBS All Access.

Tapping The Power Of The Stars — Dr. Andrea Kritcher Ph.D., Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, U.S. Department of Energy.

Dr. Andrea (Annie) Kritcher, Ph.D. is a nuclear engineer and physicist who works at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (https://www.llnl.gov/). She is the design lead of the HYBRID-E capsule technology within Lawrence Livermore’s Inertial Confinement Fusion (ICF) program, and is a member of the ICF leadership team and lead designer for shot N210808, at their National Ignition Facility, a recent experiment that heralded a significant step towards a fusion break-even target. She was elected Fellow of the American Physical Society in 2022.

Continue reading “Dr. Annie Kritcher, Ph.D. — National Ignition Facility — LLNL — Tapping The Power Of The Stars” »

Robots in their current form contribute far more to our modern day life than you may realise. They may not be the sci-fi androids many imagine, but they’re hard at work doing tasks like building cars, or learning how to control nuclear fusion (opens in new tab). Only in recent years are we starting to see robots like you might have imagined as a kid, with Boston Dynamics’ creations doing all sorts of crazy stunts (opens in new tab) like dancing (opens in new tab) or guarding Pompeii (opens in new tab).

Robotics isn’t all about metal machines it turns out, and biohybrid robots may be part of our cyberpunk future too. It’s only been a few days since I was introduced to OSCAR, an artist’s rendition of a disgustingly meaty, pulsating flesh robot (opens in new tab). As wonderful and vivid as those videos are, it’s a good time to take a palette cleanser with a look at a real-world biohybrid robot.

Rolls-Royce is now aiming to “have a reactor ready to send to the Moon by 2029.”

The UK Space Agency (UKSA) said on Friday it would invest a significant amount in Rolls-Royce’s project to produce nuclear power on the moon.

The government agency will now invest £2.9 million (around $3.52 million) in the project in order to “deliver an initial demonstration of a UK lunar modular nuclear reactor.”

Continue reading “UK to invest over $3 million in Rolls Royce’s Moon nuclear reactor” »

ST… PAUL, Minn. (AP) — Minnesota regulators said Thursday they’re monitoring the cleanup of a leak of 400,000 gallons of radioactive water from Xcel Energy’s Monticello nuclear power plant, and the company said there’s no danger to the public.

“Xcel Energy took swift action to contain the leak to the plant site, which poses no health and safety risk to the local community or the environment,” the Minneapolis-based utility said in a statement.

While Xcel reported the leak of water containing tritium to state and federal authorities in late November, the spill had not been made public before Thursday. State officials said they waited to get more information before going public with it.

A nuclear power plant along the Mississippi River in Monticello, Minnesota, has leaked more than 400,000 gallons of radioactive water due to a broken pipe. NBC’s Maggie Vespa has the details.

» Subscribe to NBC News: http://nbcnews.to/SubscribeToNBC
» Watch more NBC video: http://bit.ly/MoreNBCNews.

Continue reading “Minnesota power plant leaks 400,000 gallons of radioactive water” »

😗

After successful recommissioning in autumn 2022, the Greifswald nuclear fusion experiment has surpassed an important target. In 2023, an energy turnover of 1 gigajoule was targeted. Now the researchers have even achieved 1.3 gigajoules and a new record for discharge time on Wendelstein 7-X: the hot plasma could be maintained for eight minutes.

Continue reading “Power plasma with gigajoule energy turnover generated for eight minutes” »

The move uses a loophole in the NPT and prompts fears of nuclear proliferation.

The U.S. will lend its advanced nuclear propulsion technology to build nuclear-powered submarines for Australia as it looks to counter the rising influence of China in the Indo-Pacific region. This is the first major agreement under the AUKUS pact, a trilateral arrangement that was set up 18 months ago with the U.K., the U.S., and Australia as signatories.

Continue reading “US to transfer nuclear submarine technology to Australia under new AUKUS deal” »