Scientists recently overturned a 59-year-old belief about the magnetic fields used to contain plasma in fusion reactors. Google gave their breakthrough to Gemini 4 agents. Within hours, the AI found new solutions that went beyond what the original researchers had discovered. The result: two new ways

[u/141_1337]

[u/Starks]

Does this mean a stellarator has been the right answer the entire time and not a tokamak?

If we're wasting all of our time and money on ITER just for a chance to breed more tritium as we consume it, we've really screwed up.

[u/ThatOtherOneReddit → u/Starks]

Stellarator has always been theory optimal, you just have to spend billions first to find out if there is an engineering issue you can't overcome first. Tokamaks are simpler so people consider them "safer".

[u/Redducer → u/Starks]

ITER is mainly a jobs program, sadly.

At least there’s hope that it can be replaced with something that actually works… but I am afraid that sunken costs fallacy and politics might keep it alive. Europe’s really the fool…