Magnite Technologies develops ultra-strong,
ultra-compact magnetic field sources for aneutronic thermonuclear fusion plasma confinement
Addressed challenges
The world is challenged by growing resource scarcity impeding large-scale sea water desalination, access to energy, clean waste recycling and food security
Climate change puts even stronger pressure on fragile ecosystems, causing mass migrations, conflicts and ultimately wars
Non-fossil energy sources such as renewables and traditional nuclear power cannot fully address these challenges as they account for just 3.6% and 4.4% of global energy supply respectively
Despite widespread hopes and extensive state subsidies for renewables, their present growth rates are limited; nuclear industry has seen its growth slashed in the aftermath of Fukushima accident in 2011
Renewables are still way too costly, especially for large-scale applications: for instance, no single water desalination plant sustains cost of renewable electricity
Renewables alone are insufficient
Illustration: boron ore
Aneutronic thermonuclear fusion has the potential for low-cost power
Thermonuclear fusion was long viewed as the ultimate solution, but met with obstacles
Mainstream fusion science focuses on Deuterium Tritium reaction, which generates neutrons and puts huge safety limitations on reactor shielding
Aneutronic thermonuclear fusion, if viable, answers to energy challenge
Fuel for aneutronic fusion is abundant and low cost: boron and hydrogen
Direct conversion of reaction products to electricity without steam turbine
Less than 0.1% of aneutronic fusion products carry residual radioactivity, allowing inherently safe operation and absence of nuclear waste
Unique combination of compact, mobile and safe power plants
Aneutronic thermonuclear fusion has recently seen huge experimental and theoretical progress
Demonstrated progress
By 2018 measured reaction gains improved ×107.6 times since first experiments back in 2005 by Belyaev et al
However, reaction gain at ×10−3.4 of ignition laser beam energy (Giuffrida 2018) still falls short of breakeven
On theoretical front, magnetically confined aneutronic fusion model was proposed by Hora and Lalousis (2014), promising gains up to ×104 of ignition laser beam energy
A possibility of alpha-avalanche multiplication effect, under which produced alpha particles transfer part of their energy in a chain reaction was modelled by Eliezer (2016) and Belloni (2018)
Future prospects
Breakeven aneutronic fusion yield demonstration seems possible: until recently most aneutronic fusion experiments have been performed at small-scale lasers with low pulse intensities and / or energies, weak laser contrast and low beam quality
Launch of new laser facilities (ELI-NP, PETAL…) by 2019 provides the opportunity to test the concept experimentally at a new level and clarify models of Hora, Lalousis, Eliezer and Belloni
Experiments at these new facilities could eventually bridge the gain gap from ×10−3.4 to breakeven
According to the theory of Hora et al, key component of successful experiment at high-power laser shall be ultra-strong / ultra-compact magnetic field loop
Our contribution to aneutronic fusion development:
an ultra-compact source of ultra-strong magnetic field
Realistic and staged low-CapEx workplan differentiates our approach to aneutronic fusion
Alexis Komarov
CEO & Founder
Following graduation from Moscow State University, Alexis moved to Kyiv and started a career in a well-known local management and strategy consulting firm
Being fed up with senseless projects that later brought huge losses to company’s clients, Alexis lost motivation and got kicked out of his first job in 2007
He then joined a small strategy & management consultancy ISTRATS led by a French expatriate in Kyiv. His first project for the heir to the former “Compagnie Universelle du Canal Maritime de Suez” turned his thinking around. He came to regard his mission as very much opposite to what he has been doing before: new creation vs. redistribution of existing resources, science vs. rule of thumb, risk aligned staged CapEx vs. high-CapEx high-risk approach etc
During the following 12 years of obscurity Alexis consulted international and Ukrainian corporates and banks providing strategy and management advisory services. In parallel, he pursued his own research of new energy technologies, eventually focusing on aneutronic fusion by 2014 and coming up with the idea of ultra strong magnetic fields by specialty composite coils by 2016
To commercialize the idea, Alexis founded Magnite Technologies in 2018
