Scientists at the National Ignition Facility (NIF) at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California announced that they made it one step closer to developing hydrogen fusion ( 1 ). For the very first time in history hydrogen gave off more energy than it took in. This creates a net increase in energy by using something simple in the world. It is a potential start to something much bigger in clean energy. The system is still complex and many more years of study are necessary. At it simplest explanation a number of lasers point at a small target and condense the hydrogen. This hydrogen is made up of deuterium and tritium that fuse together. When done well it produces helium, a spare neutron and lots of energy. In this case the scientists were able to create 1.7 times the amount of energy. Still, the researchers have not been able to create ignition. This is a term which means that when comparing the total input of energy into the process there is a net gain of total
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