Nuclear fusion, the same process that powers the sun, could provide us with limitless cheap energy—but experiments to date have always used more power than they created. Now, though, researchers have apparently tipped that balance, making fusion a real possibility.Researchers at the National Ignition Facility in Livermore, California, have been conducting fusion experiments for some time. Using 192 beams from the worlds most powerful laser, they heat and compress a small pellet of hydrogen fuel until nuclear fusion reactions take place. Usually, they have to dump more power in using the lasers than they manage to create from the fusion reaction.
