South Korea’s ‘artificial sun’ KSTAR reaches 100 million degrees Celsius for 20 seconds, sets new record

South Korea’s magnetic fusion device Korea Superconducting Tokamak Advanced Research (KSTAR) has set a replacement record within the field of fusion by reaching the temperature of over 100 million degree Centigrade for a period of 20 seconds. The intensity of the temperature reached by the KSTAR are often gauged from the very fact that the source of sunshine within the whole universe- the Sun- glows at a temperature of only 15 million degrees Celsius, the Indian Express reported. In comparative terms KSTAR was ready to attain 6.6 times the temperature of the Sun.

Referred to as South Korea’s artificial Sun, the device had achieved an identical feat within the year 2018 also but the temperature could only be maintained for a really short period of 1 and a half seconds. In 2019, the device increased its performance and retained the temperature for a period of 8 seconds. What made the difference this point was the event of the interior Transport Barrier Mode which helped the device increase its performance substantially and set a replacement record.

Si-Woo Yoon, who is that the director of the KSTAR research facility at the Korea Institute of Fusion Energy, was quoted as saying during a statement that the record breaking performance of the KSTAR in maintaining the heat plasma for about 20 seconds are going to be an enormous turning point. Yoon also said that the high performance plasma operation will play an important role within the commercial fusion reactor within the future. After achieving the milestone of retaining over 100 million degrees Celsius temperature for a period of 20 seconds, the Korean Institute of Fusion Energy features a target to extend the performance to 300 seconds by the year 2025.