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(PhysOrg.com) -- The superconducting cables designed for the ITER fusion reactor (cost: 16 billion euros = $21.2 billion) are unable to withstand the planned forty to sixty thousand charge cycles. Barring a solution, the troubled mega-experiment will suffer still more delays and cost overruns.

(PhysOrg.com) -- It has been 25 years since scientists discovered the first high-temperature superconductors—copper oxides, or cuprates, that conduct electricity without a shred of resistance at temperatures much higher than other superconducting metals.

(PhysOrg.com) -- It has been 25 years since scientists discovered the first high-temperature superconductors—copper oxides, or cuprates, that conduct electricity without a shred of resistance at temperatures much higher than other superconducting metals. Yet no one has managed to explain why these cuprates are able to superconduct at all

Samuel Lazerson, an associate research physicist in advanced projects at the U.S. Department of Energy's Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL), has created a video simulation showing the intricate nature of a plasma pulse within an experimental fusion machine known as a heliotron. The simulation shows the superconducting field coils, saddle loops, and plasma of the Large Helical Device (LHD) at the National Institute for Fusion Science in Japan.

A team led by Dr.