Welcome to the 2024 season finale of the Kronos
Fusion Energy Podcast. As we conclude the 2024
season, we reflect on a year filled with insightful
discussions and groundbreaking advancements in
fusion technology. Our journey has taken us through
the intricacies of plasma physics, the development
of superconducting magnets, and the exploration
of sustainable energy solutions. We've had the
privilege of engaging with leading experts who
are at the forefront of reshaping our energy
landscape, providing listeners with a comprehensive
understanding of the challenges and triumphs
in the pursuit of clean limitless power here
at Kronos Fusion Energy. I am deeply grateful
to my co -founders and our founding board advisors
for their unwavering dedication and the wealth
of experience they bring to Kronos Fusion Energy.
Each of them is a colossus in their field and
I feel incredibly humbled to work alongside such
an exceptional group of individuals every day.
Their collective expertise and passion are the
driving forces behind our mission to revolutionize
the energy sector. Today, I'm thrilled to welcome
my co -founder, Dr. Konstantin Pachucin. Our
journey began at the Anthenium at Caltech a couple
years ago. where an electric conversation about
the future of fusion energy laid the groundwork
for our current collaboration. Since our inception
in 2022, Constantine's profound expertise in
universal mechanics and advanced mathematics
has been instrumental in advancing our mission
to create a mini sun on Earth. Dr. Bachachin,
is a renowned professor of planetary science
at Caltech, celebrated for his pioneering work
in planetary astrophysics. His research encompasses
the formation and evolution of the solar system,
the dynamic behavior of exoplanets, and the intricate
processes within planetary interiors and atmospheres.
Notably, He has been honored with the prestigious
Sloan Research Fellowship and was named a Packard
Fellow, underscoring his significant contributions
to the field. In today's episode, we embark on
a journey through the frontiers of astronomy
and fusion energy. Dr. Bachajin shares insights
into the upcoming Vera Rubin Observatory set
to become operational in 2025 and its potential
role in discovering Planet X. We also explored
the distinctions between the James Webb Space
Telescope, optimized for close observations and
spectrum analysis, and the Vera Rubin Observatory,
designed for wide field searches. Additionally,
We get into the utilization of particle accelerators
in fusion and material sciences, particularly
in isotope production, and discuss advancements
like ADS and accelerator -driven fusion for future
material innovations. Our conversation then extends
into the theoretical concept of muon -catalyzed
fusion. examining the potential of muons to drive
fusion reactions and the challenges posed by
their short lifespans and decay tendencies. We
also consider the prospects of future cold fusion
generators emphasizing the necessity for the
advancements in superconductors and material
science over the next century. Dr. Bachchan highlights
the transformative role of artificial intelligence
in managing complex simulations and optimizing
fusion energy stability, especially with quantum
computing's capability to handle multidimensional
calculations. We reflect on the evolution from
theoretical quantum mechanics to practical quantum
computing, discussing how qubits can enhance
complex simulations in fusion. We also get into
his ongoing research on Jupiter's primordial
state, using the orbital dynamics of its moons
to infer conditions billions of years ago. The
episode concludes with an exploration of the
potential impact of next -generation telescopes
and fusion technology in the near future. The
way he sees it, at the end of the day, all the
physics, fusion energy and math are a big ruse
to further his music career. So don't forget
to check out the seventh season. Link below.
where Constantine is the lead vocalist and guitarist.
The Seventh Season is a Los Angeles -based rock
band. Their powerful vocals, electrifying guitars,
solid bass lines, and dynamic drumming create
an energetic sound that has captivated audiences
across the globe. So don't forget to check out
Seventh Season's latest releases and experience
their captivating performances. I am Priyanka
Ford, the founder of Kronos Fusion Energy. How
are you doing, Constantine? Listen, I'm doing
great. I'm doing great. Science is coming along,
you know, spooky weather is here, so my favorite
time of the year. Halloween is my favorite thing
ever. Yeah, yeah, I like the time of the year.
Yeah, the whole changing of the weather, it's
beautiful. Have we found that planet yet? Planet
X? Have we found that yet? The night is young
and full of terrors. We haven't found it yet
because I think most people have stopped actually
searching in the last year or so. And that's
because there's a new telescope coming online
next year that's going to kind of eat everybody's
lunch, so to speak. What else is to you, which
is also known as the Vera Rubin Observatory?
starts operations and that's scheduled for, science
operations are scheduled for summer of 2025,
it will scan the sky up and down kind of every
night. And so it won't scan the entire sky, of
course, because it's in the southern hemisphere
and parts of the northern sky are unavailable
to it, but it's gonna get a lot of... I'm just
going to get a lot of stuff and that's going
to be really a revolutionary point for all outer
solar system research. And yeah, I think that
telescope has the best chance of finding Planet
Nine and if not it will at the very least kind
of independently confirm or refute for that matter
the various lines of evidence that we have for
it. This is better than the JWSD or just different
better? It's different, yeah. So JWST is an infrared
telescope which is designed basically for characterization.
So you can look at one thing with exceptional
precision and take its spectrum. That's what
JWST is good for. The Barrow -Rubin Observatory
is an optical telescope and it's ground -based
and it has a huge field of view. So it's kind
of a, it's more of a search instrument rather
than a characterization instrument. So yeah,
you don't want to be searching for your target
with like a sniper rifle, right? You want to
be searching with something with a larger field
of view, like binoculars, but then you want to
characterize it with a, you know, with something
like JWST. So once we find Planet 9, we'll definitely
look at it with JWST to figure out what its atmosphere
is made out of and if it has a surface, you know,
that kind of thing. Nice and and you have The
only reason you can use this Sniper scope is
because you've mathematically done the calculation
To figure that point out. Is that right? Yeah,
I mean it's it's kind of The only reason there's
motivation I would say to look for the planet
in the outer solar system in the first place
is because like you said the mathematics points
to the existence of a planet in the outer solar
system. I mean, the solar system, at this point,
its structure makes no sense if there isn't something
out there shepherding the small object's gravitation.
Do you mind explaining that? That's fascinating.
So where is it actually pulling on the entire
solar system, on our outer planets? How big is
it? How much is it pulling? Okay, so this is
a... I'm glad you asked this because I think
I have something like an explanation. the calculations
point to a planet that's about five Earth masses,
okay, and that goes around the sun once every
10 or 20 ,000 years, and does so on an appreciably
eccentric orbit. So an orbit that's kind of elliptical
and out and around, right? So does it pull on
everything? Sure, it does. But its effects are
amplified the further out you go away from the
sun. So for example, if you were to say, what
effect would it have on the Earth's orbit? The
answer is it shifts the Earth's location by about
one meter compared to planet nine's not there.
So that's a genuinely pathetic effect, right?
Like changing the location of the Earth by three
feet just doesn't matter. But if you go out beyond
the orbit of Neptune, for scale, Neptune's at
30 times the distance between the Earth and the
Sun. And if you go another order of magnitude
out, for things that are 300 astronomical units
and beyond, there you really get to see this
planet kind of pulling all the orbits into a
common direction. shifting their orbital plane
by about 20 degrees relative to the plane of
the solar system. And so you can kind of see
almost this floral arrangement or maybe it's
a gravitational arrangement of orbits that are
well beyond Neptune that require some form of
sculpting by an exterior agent. And we know that
that exterior agent cannot be the galaxy. we
know it cannot be the ORD cloud. The place where
you have to put the protuber is kind of in that
intermediate part of real estate between the
conventional solar system and what we call the
ORD cloud, so the edge of the interstellar space.
So yeah, it's an exciting time to be working
on this stuff. We know the gravitational effects
of the Earth cloud Oort cloud Yeah, we do because
it's significantly I thought it was just like
a mist or just kind of like Saturn's rings where
it was like a bunch of rocks But it has a cohesive
effect Do we does it have more of a pull and
certain parts of it and less than others based
on the mass? What am I asking? Yeah. Yeah, so
the Oort cloud in total is about is a sort of
a few Earth masses Okay, so it's not it is composed
of You know comments basically But cumulatively
it's not as negligible as Saturn's rings like
Saturn's rings don't have any mass The only reason
they look cool is because they're reflective
and they really don't weigh very much. So we
do know the gravitational effect of the Oort
cloud and it turns out to be pretty negligent.
And that's why you need something else. You can
compute what the Oort cloud cumulatively will
do. and it would sort of change outer solar system
orbits on time scale of like 10 billion years.
So something comparable to the age of the universe.
But the solar system is only five billion years
old. So even at best, the world cloud just does
not compete. And that's why there has to be this
other thing. And the word cloud, I think, is
It kind of throws you off makes you think it's
like yeah, and usually astrophysics is so good
about getting the name so spot -on It's a halo
of Debris or planetesimals or comets, right?
How cool that's so awesome like The fact that
this is your job is it's so spectacular or part
of your job. I guess. Yeah. Yeah I mean, I still
kind of get surprised that I get paid. It was
kind of one of these things where I feel really
fortunate in a multifaceted sense of working
on things I love and being able to do that and
kind of survive. That's the dream, right? Yeah,
hey, I get that. That's how I feel every day.
I'm like, haha, I'd have done this for free.
Yeah, interesting. Did you want, is this what
you wanted to do as a child? What did you want
to be as a child? Oh, as a child, I was pretty
sure that I was going to be a particle accelerator
physicist. Like dad. Yeah, that sounds kind of
specific. But part of the reason for that is
the kid. you know we like I grew up on campus
of a facility with a particle accelerator and
I think you know it's one of these things where
you kind of um you you do the thing that or at
least as a kid you think you want to do the thing
that you are exposed to and because there was
a particle accelerator a lot of people I knew
were physicists or kids of physicists I was like,
well, I guess that's kind of like what you have
to become when you grow up. And then I later
realized that you don't have to become a particle
accelerator physicist. And in fact, that's kind
of a niche thing. And so the thing that I was
going to do is be a professional musician. and
our band is going to become the next Metallica.
And I think we're about three or four shows away
from that happening right now. I feel it, yeah.
I feel it. I've heard it and I feel it. I'm right
there with you. That's right. It was supposed
to be dethroned. Poor Planet Nine. It will have
to wait just a little longer. Yeah. Oh, particle
exfoliator. Yeah. You know, I run into people
when we talk about fusion. People talk about,
oh, you know, they ask what type of fusion and
whether we are what we're going after. And what
they're really asking is Are we using fusion
for electricity? Are we using it for heat? Are
we using it for like material development? So
it took me a while to kind of build that bridge
between particle accelerators and fusion and
material development. But I feel like you built
that bridge like decades ago. Like, can you help
us? with how fusion and particle accelerators
and new material or isotope development, like
how it comes together? Yeah, so there's really
a multitude of ways, but the first two that come
to mind immediately. So let's talk first about
production of lithium, right? Like lithium -7
is a good way to make tritium, right? You irradiate
lithium -7 with a high -intensity beam of protons,
and then it decays into helium and tritium. And
so that, for a long time, was kind of viewed
as as the most viable mechanism to source tritium.
And it's still very much up in the community.
That's still something that is consistently discussed.
And fusion aside, when it comes to fission, the
byproduct of nuclear fission can be made also
less radioactive. by irradiating them with a
high -intensity beam of charged particles. And
that's because you basically peel off the isotopes
of, I would say, uranium that are still radioactive.
And so those systems are called ADS, system accelerator
-driven systems. Now, there's also a distinct
approach to fusion, right, which actually uses
particle beams to collide them and drive fusion
that way. So rather than, you know, doing like
the usual thing in a tokamak where you just crank
up the temperature to the point where you try
to, you know, have tritium and deuterium, say,
or, you know, helium -3 or helium -3 come in
and just cross the kind of... you cool a barrier
and combine just because the temperature is so
high. The accelerator German diffusion is distinct
in that you first accelerate the particles or
whatever particles that you want. I mean, typically
it's heavy ions. And then have those collide
at a fast enough energy. So it's just a different
approach. But yeah, the two things have, the
two kind of fields. development right both the
accelerator science and and just plasma physics
in general of course which is so critically relevant
for fusion have always gone hand -in -hand and
they've always kind of developed together so
there's a lot of cross -pollination between the
two ideas yeah That's fascinating. I remember
the first time we met in person at Caltech, you
explained muons to me and how you could produce
those in particle accelerators and somehow put
them into a tokamak to make fusion better. I
would love another explanation of that one because
I kind of found it fascinating. But I never forgot
that conversation, just the possibility of how
that could make for a more compact reactor. Tell
us about that, Konstantin. Yeah. Okay. So it's
actually, it's a genuinely fascinating thing,
which also historically links up to, you know,
cold fusion, right? Like during the 80s, there
was a... There was a moment of excitement about
cold fusion, which turned out totally to be kind
of a red herring. It was totally fake. But what's
interesting is that the words cold fusion actually
originate from a 1956 New York Times article
exactly talking about not the 80s things, but
the muon catalyzed nuclear fusion. So first,
what is a muon? Well, muon is a is a negatively
charged lepton, which is a type of particle with
a mass about 200 times that of an electron. So
you can really, you can think of it just as a
very, very heavy electron, okay? And the unfortunate
thing about muons is that they last about 2 .2
microseconds because, and after a while, after
a while, meaning after 2 .2 microseconds, they
decay into a neutrino, which is a different type
of particle, and a conventional electron. But
while it lasts, like during its lifespan, what
the muon can do is it can replace one of the
electrons in the hydrogen molecule, okay? And
that allows the two nuclei to draw far closer
than the normal covalent bond, okay? And because
of that, the probability of just regular deuterium
-terium fusion increases by a ton. And then after
a fusion reaction occurs, like the muon that
is responsible for catalyzing that reaction is
in principle free to catalyze other events until
it decays. or is somehow, you know, removed.
So it's, it's really, really cool. And gosh,
if it, if it worked better, we would have had
fusion, you know, that fusion reactors properly
in the fifties. Now the reason there's a problem
with this approach is that, well, the muon doesn't
last very long. Okay. So it only has two microseconds
before it goes away. And the other problem is
that it sticks to alpha particles, which are
the helium nuclei. And so if you can somehow
solve the time scale and the sticking problem,
then you're in business. But indeed, muons are
readily generated by particle accelerators. I
mean, muons are actually even generated in the
atmosphere. So the cosmic rays, which are just
charged particles that fly around in space as
they impact our atmosphere, they create a shower
of particles and one of the things that comes
out is muon. So I still think it's one of the
coolest things ever because it puts fusion just
barely, it's just a little bit out of reach.
I wish there was a simple solution. Interesting.
Maybe there's a complicated solution. So it looks
like maybe 30 years down the line, there will
be a possibility of cold fusion generators, but
it would be some combination of the muon, some
combination of a laser plasma heating system.
a lot of lot and a lot a lot of material material
innovations in terms of like superconductors
and Room temperature superconductors things like
that Yeah, it said it'll be it's all I think
about what do you say two to three decades away?
I Mean the way things are going I'm more optimistic
than that, right? I mean, I think that, well,
I mean, material science generally right now
is kind of having a moment. And so I'm, I mean,
of course it's hard to predict the future. It's
easier to predict the past. But yeah, I'm kind
of optimistic given the explosion of both kind
of theoretical work that's been done. in the
last decade and a half kind of predicting different
phases, what kind of materials are in principle
possible. And that stuff is starting to get experimentally
tested and there's a huge, huge amount of research
being done in that realm. So I'm... I have to
say, I hope it doesn't take two to three decades.
I think it'll be faster than that. And I don't
know how the muon thing will play out, but surely
the superconducting -like magnets, things that
can produce huge fields on the order of 10 Pesla
or whatever, that's going to be a prerequisite.
for regular tokamak devices. And so in that regard,
there's been progress left and right in the last
decade. So I'm very, very optimistic about that.
Yeah. Yet another kind of convergence field between
particle accelerators and fusion energy, or the
superconducting magnets. Yeah. It's it's it's
awesome. Yeah, it's it's the convergence of all
of those and and of course AI and material development
with quantum computing and AI That's gonna be
huge. I think in this regard right AI is going
to play a critically important role if anything
for its ability to think In more than you know
four dimensions like human beings just naturally
don't have the capacity to think in greater than
40. I mean, I have a hard time thinking in like
2D. I usually think in just one dimension. But
the fact that artificial intelligence is not
limited in this way means that from a fundamental
perspective, it can kind of... it can keep track
of plasma instabilities potentially far better
than we can. And so I think that there's kind
of an untapped future in this regard where AI
systems will be able to machine learn the various
instabilities and potentially suppress them.
human minds cannot do. And so that's another
realm where I think the kind of convergence and
the cross -pollination of those fields is going
to be critical for progress. Yeah, for sure.
We've been thinking out our AI system within
all of this and we think about how the fusion
energy generation aspect of it and those simulations
itself, yeah, there's quite a bit we can do with
AI with self -healing walls with nanotechnology
and plasma and mitigation and all of that. But
then we think about all of the things you can
do with AI in terms of like marketing and sales
and financial reporting and all of that to keep
things accurate. And so it's pretty exciting
because there's a larger convergence there as
well. Because when you look at your end -to -end
system of even customer management or like when
you look at order of like any commercial product
not just you know something that we're doing
but like It's it's pretty cool. It's It's Kind
of wild that all of this stuff is happening right
now like it's it's kind of it feels like Yeah,
it feels like a really kind of monumental time
in history. I always wondered what it was like
in the early 1900s when quantum mechanics was
getting discovered and how cool it would have
been to witness that and to be involved in that,
to be a part of that revolution. But I think
right now we're part of a somewhat different
revolution, but it's equally cool. It didn't
have to be but it's an interesting time to be
alive. Hey, I'm just I'm grateful. I don't question
it. I just say thank you. I you know the thing
about that you said multidimensional calculations
and quantum so that kind of brings about like
doing multidimensional calculations for simulations
using quantum computing. And the convergence
of the hardware and the software of that, meaning
the quantum computing coming together with the
AI to build these like robust, like digital twin
simulations and prototypes and the possibilities
of those in every field, especially ours, but
in every field. That's that's like mind blowing
to me, but I've never kind of like understood
the actual bridge of Why a quantum computer allows
you to do this multidimensional calculation like
far better than, you know, shall we say, conventional
computing? Yeah, I didn't want to be offensive
conventional supercomputing. Yeah. Well, yeah,
help us help us understand that that multidimensionality
of quantum computing. and how that yeah and i'll
be honest i'm not at all an expert in quantum
computing right there are tasks right the tasks
for which quantum computers fundamentally right
because they don't like a classical computer
thinks in terms of you know bits right the flipping
of zero one and and a quantum computer thinks
in terms of cubits which are which are states
So fundamentally, they work in a little bit of
a different way. The principle, by the way, has
been around for a long, long time. I mean, Feynman
wrote about quantum computing, and he died, I
don't remember exactly what year he died, but
he died in the early 80s. So I think the principle
has been with us for quite some time, but the
reason, and to be clear, the quantum computer,
is not necessarily something that you would use
in like your calculator, right? A regular classical
computer is just fine as a calculator, but there's
certain tasks for which the quantum computer
works better. Now for a long time it was an issue
of like just building one, right? Like getting
one to, getting your computing system to be stable.
and not, like, interacting with the walls, for
example, because, you know, quantum mechanics
is a beautiful and tricky thing, right? Things
are not... There are no trajectories, there are
no particles, so to speak, there are wave functions
which will tend to couple to walls, and that's
been a problem for some time. But, you know,
again, right now... Like with a lot of other
things, we're living through an interesting kind
of intersection point where that's becoming much
more of a reality. Yeah. How does it go from
like this theoretical world of like Feynman talking
about these quantum states and how that exists
in the universe? And and how did we turn that
into a computing? technology you know like that
bridge of it it it's yeah I it's mind -boggling
to me how it goes from Einstein hypothesizing
it and that's your field you know like you guys
are I don't know how you guys do it like that's
that's amazing well I appreciate it and I'm no
fine man and you know to you know and I think
nobody nobody is he was a it was one of the kind
of unique minds of the 20th century. And that
said, you know, there are numerous examples of
times in science where you kind of know that
stuff is going to work, but it's just the technology
is not there yet to make it work. I mean, a good
example is you know, in signal processing, for
example, right? Like a Fourier transform is something
that you do routinely. And there's a method to
computing discrete Fourier transforms called
fast Fourier transforms. And fast Fourier transforms
were already invented by Gauss in like the 1800s.
And he was frustrated by the fact that computers
were not there to perform them. I mean, this
is kind of along the lines of what you're talking
about, right? You realize that the principle
is there and just the computational power is
on there. Gauss, by the way, was also the first
person to conduct a true simulation of planetary
motion, full scale, all the planets interacting
with each other, which is not a problem that
you can solve on a piece of paper. Right. And
he realized that you would have to discretize
that problem and solve it via simulation. And
the way he did it is he got a bunch of friends
and like the people were the computers and they
would pass pieces of paper around and propagate
errors and do this stuff. And it worked. The
only problem was that it worked slower than real
time. You were better off just sitting back and
watching the planets orbiting the sun. But still,
like That was a legit numerical simulation. It
was running on very slow processors, otherwise
known as the human brain. How far we've come.
We've recently had conversations about having
sensors and transmitters put into fusion energy
generators that have to withstand an immense
amount of heat. and also be able to communicate
with the quantum computer and have like high
speeds. And so it's a challenging task. It's
a challenging material, physics, and yeah, it's
a, yeah, it's a challenging task. It's a, it's
a tall order. We'll see. Yeah, but why, yeah,
if it, if it wasn't, right? Like, if it wasn't,
it wouldn't be fun and also it wouldn't have
been done already. That's true. Yeah, sorry,
I'm vehemently agreeing with you here Very cool.
Yeah, but the fact that it What do you say about
a hundred year gap between when? quantum quantum
states or quantum physics came to be to when
we can use a quantum computer and Tune the neural
network such that we can process in high enough
speeds to control a plasma in a tiny sun on earth.
Like that roadmap is chock full of amazing scientists.
Yeah. Yeah. It's about a hundred year gap, which
is kind of, actually, I hadn't quite, I mean,
a little bit more. I think we're now kind of
past the first formulations, of course, of certainly
we're past the 100 year mark for the formulation
of what's called the old quantum theory. But
yeah, I never, it's actually, it would be an
interesting exercise to, you know, really take
every invention and measure what's the time scale
in between the conceptualization of it being
possible and not. I would say the radio was a
little shorter. The radio was invented by something
like early 1900s, right? And Maxwell's equations
were fully understood by Maxwell in the 1860s.
So there was kind of a shorter than a century
time to go in between, but surely the order of
magnitude is correct. So yeah, that's it. Yeah,
I never quite thought about that time span in
between original theory and then what you could
do with it. Yeah, some some harder than others,
I suppose. What do you see now that that's probably
in like a very raw theoretical stage that has
like just world changing or maybe solar system
changing implications in the next century. What
do you think? Well, so yeah, as you know, there's
a, okay, good question. So I have a former student
named Walker Melton who did his undergraduate
thesis with me at Caltech on kind of analogies
between quantum mechanics and the propagation
of waves in self gravitating disks. And then
he went on to Harvard and he now works on stuff
that I frankly don't understand at all. Like
I was trying to read a couple of his papers a
month ago and I couldn't understand any of the
sentences. Right, and it sort of felt like kind
of a gorilla that's been handed like a wrench.
Where I'm like, okay, I know this does something.
What is it? Like warp, warp, like a wormhole
or something? Like what are we doing? Like we're
warping time? The paper was about the amplitude
of the celestial leap. I have no idea or like
computing the amplitudes of celestial leap. So
I have no idea what that means. What's a celestial
leap? Is that like what happened in the Interstellar
movie? No, no, it has nothing to do, as far as
I can tell, it has nothing to do with celestial
mechanics. Every time I talk to Walker about
it, he said, well, just consider it gravity in
a box. And I was like, yeah. You know, again,
like, what do you mean, like, gravity takes a
pull inside a box? He's like, no, like, take
gravity, the theory of gravity, and put it into
a box. And that's kind of where my understanding
stops. But I do wonder. I mean, I'm sure that
there were people 100 years ago who saw quantum
mechanics as some weird thing that's equally
impenetrable as the celestial leaf amplitude
is to me. And so, yeah, there's a lot of development
like that that's happening right now that I'm...
kind of not involved in, because ultimately,
just from my own preference, I like, there's
certain branches of physics that I like. I enjoy
things being, maybe I don't want to say practical,
but you know, I enjoy being able to imagine what
actually is happening, you know what I mean?
Yeah. And so like, there's an applied aspect
to to kind of solicit mechanics and orbital dynamics
and plasma physics, there's a joy in kind of
being able to imagine its direct effects. So
to that said, I'm probably locked out of some
of the things that will be a century from now
making revolutionary technological strides. The
Celestial Leaf might be part of it, I just don't
know. Interesting, yeah, wow. I googled the Celestial
Leaf and I couldn't find an explanation. A friend
of mine sent me a link to a Steam community post
about how there's some video game where if you
get stuck on the Celestial Leaf, you have to
have the Celestial Leaf blower. And that's about
the explanation, like, the extent of the explanation
that I... No, I was... You know what I was about
to say? I was about to say I feel like I have
seen gravity being turned off and on in, like,
a superhero movie. I can't put my finger on which
one, but I feel like I've seen that conceptually
in, like... It's got to be, like, some sort of
sci -fi stuff. Maybe Futurama, because... That's
my favorite show on the planet. So maybe it was
there. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Makes sense. Yeah, it
might have been. You've watched Futurama. You
like Futurama, Konstantin? Of course, of course.
I mean, it's been a moment since then, but like,
yeah. Gosh, it's like in college, this was kind
of a staple for it. At Caltech, really? Yeah,
one of my favorite moments in that it was when
the robot goes to sleep in the closet. Sleeping
and just kind of sleep talking is like destroy
all humanity, destroy all humanity. And then
he gets woken up and he's like, oh, sorry, I
was just having a wonderful dream. I love it.
Yeah, no, I love that show. I love it so much.
Yeah, downright my favorite. Watching it in Caltech,
but in a way, that's almost super cool. I've
seen garbage being incinerated in that one. That
one always fascinates me because I feel like
I can build a fusion energy generator that would
produce so much heat that it would just incinerate
just about every garbage and with nothing left,
not even smoke. I get some ideas from Futurama
every now and then. But the thing I did want
to ask you about sometime, I've been thinking
about this for a while, when I talk to people
about magnetic fields and creating magnetic fields
to confine plasma, but then you think about like,
you take that up to like 150 Tesla, I don't know
the number, I'm just making this one up. Like,
if you take it to 150 Tesla or something, is
that the Einstein -Rosen bridge? Is that where
you get into the possibilities of being able
to bend? I don't know what I'm asking here, but
it's more for scale. Right. Yeah. 150 Tesla.
OK. It is. you know, about a million gals, which
is the typical magnetic field of like a white
dwarf star. So such fields are not, yeah, they're
not, you know, out of this world, so to speak.
Like they happen all the time in astrophysics
and there's nothing scary. Nothing, nothing scary
happens when you reach those, like you can elevate
a frog. pretty well with the strong magnetic
field, but that's about, you know, that's about
the concept. So yeah, there's nothing horrific.
But these are all things that are a long way
away. And I think, yeah, and I think a lot of
our work now is quite grounded in reality in
the next 10 years, I suppose. Yes, yes. What
are you working on like now other than the planet
X Constantine? Well You know, I've got I'm excited
about fusion. I'm excited about AI a bit of an
AI startup going I'm also right now I'm involved
in a in a really cool calculation to constrain
and understands the primordial radius of Jupiter,
the primordial magnetic field and the primordial
accretion rate. So around Jupiter, there are
the satellites that are famed Galilean satellites,
like Io, Europa, Ganymede, Callisto. But interior
to Io, there are these tiny satellites that are
just like nobody cares about, they're called
the Amalthea group. What I found is that by carefully
studying the dynamical footprint, the orbital
dynamics interactions between the Galilean satellites
and the small satellites, you can deduce many
of the properties of Jupiter four and a half
billion years ago. And you can do this calculation
actually kind of on a piece of paper, which is
pretty remarkable. And so the upshot of all of
this is that when the solar nebula dissipated,
so like when the gaseous cloud got evaporated
from around the sun, Jupiter was twice as big
as it is now and had a magnetic field of about
200 gauss. Also, this is 0 .02 Tesla. Nothing
like what we like to talk about. Chronos, of
course, but this is bigger than what it is now
for Jupiter, which is about 10. And it was a
creating material, like a creating an atmosphere
at a rate of about a Jupiter mass per million
years. So this is just a cute calculation. I'm
really excited about it now. It just got accepted
for publication. like a week ago. So that's the
thing that I'm thinking about a lot. That's awesome.
Yeah, it is kind of the paper. Yeah, I'd love
to. Yeah, even if I understand like 2 % of it,
I'd love to read it. That's amazing. That's amazing.
And then with the when does this telescope come
online next year then the new one? So I think
it's supposed to start operation. maybe in the
winter of 2025, but science operations begin
in the summer of 2025. So it's going to be a
pretty cool, you know, pretty busy time. Yeah,
yeah. Exciting times. Exciting times. Exciting
times for Fusion 2 next year. Absolutely. Yeah,
big timelines. That's awesome. This was great.
Thank you so much for doing this, Constantine.
Thank you so much, Priyanka. I really appreciate
it.