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​On the way to designing and constructing the ITER Port Plug Test Facility, the ongoing gasket test campaign at the Russian company Cryogenmash marks an important milestone.

Click here to view the video produced by ITER Russia.

The 2nd International Symposium on Science at J-PARC will be held from 12 to 15 July 2014 in Tsukuba (Ibaraki) Japan.

Hosted by the J-PARC Center (High Energy Accelerator Research Organization, KEK, and the Japan Atomic Energy Agency, JAEA), the symposium will cover the wide range of science programs at J-PARC including accelerator physics, particle and nuclear physics, and materials and life sciences.

​Early bird registration is open through 16 June on the J-PARC 2014 website.

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Scientist puts forward a sustainable energy plan where nuclear fuel is created using magnetic or laser fusion. News accounts are coming in daily confirming that the reliance on fossil fuels for energy is adversely affecting the world we live in: the National Climate Assessment detailed how climate change is creating havoc with our planet today and lists the burning of fossil fuels as the predominate cause; two teams of scientists just reported the irreversible glacial collapse of an Antarctic ice sheet as a result of warming ocean temperatures; and California's record drought and heat are producing wildfires and driving up food prices. It is evident that we must invest in alternative methods of energy production as soon as possible. Nuclear energy produces carbon free energy, and is responsible for 13% of the world's electricity today, but fission-based reactors present environmental hazards and utilize less than 1% of the fuel. Nuclear fusion has held promise that the process will provide clean energy with a limitless supply of fuel. However, decades of research have not produced a viable nuclear fusion power plant. Is there another path forward? In the June issue of the Journal of Fusion Energy, Dr. Wallace Manheimer has laid out a plan that would enable Fusion Breeding as a means to meet mid-century energy needs, based on the scientific underpinnings of current fusion technology and on current nuclear infrastructure. In this approach, a Fusion Reactor is designed to not only produce electricity, but also to create nuclear fuel that can run thermal nuclear reactors. A fusion breeder is about ten times as a prolific a fuel producer as a fission breeder, i.e. a fast neutron fission reactor such as the Integral Fast Reactor. Read the whole article on phys.org website

​ITER is the most complex experiment ever attempted on this planet. Its aim, to demonstrate that nuclear fusion, the power of the Sun, can give us pollution free energy that we can use for millions of years. But at the moment, it's still largely a vast building site in the Haut Provence of southern France ...

Roland Pease has been to Cadarache to see how work is progressing, and to hear of the hopes of the scientists who have dedicated their working lives to the dream.

Listen to the 30-minute documentary from the BBC World Service program Discovery here.