floofloofUS scientists achieve net energy gain for second time in a fusion reaction
SibboSo, how long was this reaction? “Brief moment” is not very detailed. At the Wendelstein X reactor, they can keep up a fusion reaction for around half an hour without anything overheating.
I’m not sure if the time scale would be measurable. Nanoseconds at most. But the relevant part is that it’s ignition.
A device to harness inertial confinement fusion would work very very differently to a magnetic confinement one if that were the goal here (it’s not, it’s a weapons research facility). Essentially heating something up a lot in milliseconds and then extracting the heat over hours to months.