British Teenager Builds World’s First School Fusion Reactor And Produces Plasma In It

British schoolboy Cesare Mencarini has built a functioning thermonuclear reactor in preparation for his A-level exams. The reactor appears to be the first to be built in a “school setting.”

The development of a tabletop thermonuclear reactor was proposed by 17-year-old Cesare Mencarini. The work was carried out as part of a two-year A-Levels educational program, which provides an opportunity to prepare for admission to higher education institutions in the country or abroad. The first reaction of teachers to the proposal to build a thermonuclear reactor at school was concern about the consequences of its launch. The student also requested a significant amount for expenses – £ 20 thousand. In the end, he received permission and only £ 8 thousand, which forced him to seriously work on optimizing the reactor design. Sources and the designer himself do not report the parameters of the plasma achieved in the reactor (it was obtained in June 2024). It was only stated that a vacuum of 0.008 mm Hg was achieved in the working chamber using a TRIVAC D 2.5 E vacuum pump and that 30 kV power was supplied from a 5 kV Unilab power source.

For safety and other reasons, the teenager was forced to make certain compromises: for example, it is difficult to create pressure like on the Sun. However, this does not make the work of Cesare Mencarini any less important.