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The spark of the Super: Teller–Ulam and the birth of the H-bomb—rivalry, credit, and legacy at 75 years
In early 1951, Los Alamos scientists Edward Teller and Stanislaw Ulam devised a breakthrough that would lead to the hydrogen bomb [1]. Their design gave the United States an initial advantage in the Cold War, though comparable progress was soon achieved independently in the Soviet Union and the United Kingdom.
Myron A. Hoffman Lawrence, D. S. Rowe
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 6 | Number 2 | September 1984 | Pages 288-304
Technical Paper | Nonelectrical Application | doi.org/10.13182/FST84-A23159
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Using energy from a fusion reactor to produce such synfuels as hydrogen is a challenging goal because of the special thermal requirements imposed on the blanket design. The interfacing of the tandem mirror reactor to the General Atomic thermochemical process (TCP) for hydrogen production considering two types of interfacing approaches is investigated. The first uses electrical energy to joule heat a high-temperature part of the TCP and can have an overall plant efficiency of ∼30 to 36%. The second approach uses high-temperature thermal energy to heat the high-temperature part of the TCP and has an overall plant efficiency of 43%. The trade-off between these two approaches involves consideration of overall plant efficiency versus the feasibility of developing a cost-effective, high-temperature blanket and heat transport system for long lifetime and high reliability.