Chapter 373 Need Manpower

While Connie was on the road with the cooperative research and development agreement, Professor Pablo Herero also sent a doctoral student to Lu Zhou.

Not here at Princeton, though.

Instead, head to the Sarot Institute in California.

With the signing of the cooperative research and development agreement, research on superconducting materials has begun. The two research teams have joined forces, and the progress of the project seems to have wings.

However, even if the situation is very good, Lu Zhou did not expect to get the result immediately.

The essence of science is trial and error, and there are many "errors" that they need to try.

Superconducting materials are only a part of nuclear fusion engineering, but not all of it.

With the launch of the superconducting project of carbon nanomaterials, Lu Zhou also started his theoretical research on plasma.

Regarding magnetically confined controllable nuclear fusion, whether it is a tokamak or a stellarator, they all face a common problem. And the three core elements are high temperature, high density, and long-term restraint!

There are still many solutions for the former. The more common ones are laser ignition, heating the plasma itself by energizing it, and compressing the volume of the plasma to release heat...Of course, multiple solutions can also be used together.

However, it is the latter two that are really difficult - high density and long time constraints.

Plasma is not a very safe thing. According to the formula Re=ρvd/μ of Reynolds number, the high-density plasma bound by the electromagnetic field has a relatively large Reynolds number. Any slight disturbance will make the whole plasma composed of plasma The system produces disordered and irregular turbulent flow.

Relatively speaking, stellarators have certain advantages in confining plasma, and need to consider many disturbance factors less than tokamak.

However, even without many disturbing factors, it is still not an easy task to confine these restless plasmas in a small space.

The power of theory is greater than this.

When there is a reliable and concise theoretical model, even if it is just a phenomenological model that is easy to use, it can have extraordinary significance for the entire nuclear fusion project.

It can be said that, as far as the current research is concerned, one of the bottlenecks faced by the controllable nuclear fusion technology in the theoretical field is that it is difficult to establish a reliable theoretical model for the plasma in a specific fusion device.

This is what troubled Lu Zhou.

Whether it is the Euler-Lagrange equation or the NS equation, these seemingly concise theories, when used to solve specific problems, the difficulty will increase exponentially.

If the existence and smoothness of NS equations are the century-old problems of mathematics, then the turbulence phenomenon of viscous fluids satisfying NS equations is the century-old problems of physics.

And the "turbulence phenomenon of plasma" he studied belongs to a part of this century's puzzle.

In the office of the Institute for Advanced Study, Lu Zhou, who was sitting at the desk, was staring intently at the glass and steel cup on the table, as if in a daze.

The cup is not big, similar to the lid of a thermos bottle. The liquid contained in it is tumbling like boiling water, and white smoke is constantly overflowing from the edge of the cup.

Walking over with the lesson plan in her arms, Vera, who was about to report on the teaching situation of the last number theory class, looked curiously at Lu Zhou who was in a daze.

In her impression, Lu Zhou rarely spends his time in a daze.

"Professor, what are you doing?"

"Find inspiration."

Obviously, Lu Zhou wasn't in a daze, but his thoughts had reached a deadlock.

Staring at the churning liquid in the glass, the tip of the pen in his hand began to lightly lighten the notebook.

On that, though, is just a short one-line equation.

【ρ{V/t+（V.Δ）·V}=-ΔP+ρg+μΔV】

The equation itself is not difficult. The left side is the rate of change of momentum of the fluid unit, and the right side is the various forces acting on the fluid unit.

However, nothing difficult, just the equation itself...

Vera didn't bother him to find inspiration, but curiously accompanied him, staring at the cup on the table together.

Gradually, the white smoke overflowing from the mouth of the cup became weaker and weaker, and the liquid in the cup became less and less.

After a while, the liquid in the cup completely disappeared, Vera blinked and looked closer.

"It's gone."

"Yes."

Lu Zhou didn't explain anything, and motioned Vera to take a few steps back.

Then, he put on the insulated gloves that he threw on the corner of the table, lifted a short and thin liquid helium bottle from under the table, and poured it into the glass steel cup like pouring wine.

The glass steel cup was filled with transparent liquid again, and the liquid surface boiled again, emitting white smoke.

After putting down the liquid helium bottle, Lu Zhou kept a safe distance and continued to quietly watch the boiling liquid helium in the cup.

Liquid helium at ultra-low temperature exhibits a superfluid phenomenon, the viscosity coefficient is close to 0, and the Reynolds number tends to infinity, which can be regarded as a fluid close to an ideal state.

Although it seems that it is more restless than a "stationary" liquid, from a mathematical point of view, the amount of calculation involved is much smaller.

In a sense, plasma in a magnetically confined vacuum chamber also exists with a large Reynolds number. It has a large density ρ and a not small diameter d, but because of the existence of the viscosity coefficient, it is not as exaggerated as liquid helium.

And this also means that its mathematical form is far more complicated than liquid helium in a superfluid state...

"Professor, why do I feel so cold in the office?"

Hardy, who was sitting at the desk on the other side, shivered while holding his arms, and looked towards Lu Zhou.

"Because I poured some liquid helium." Lu Zhou said lightly, then suddenly thought of something, looked at Qin Yue who was sitting by the window and said, "Qin Yue, open the window for me. "

"Good professor." Qin Yue put down the pen in his hand and went to open the window.

After the windows were opened, the office gradually became much warmer.

Suddenly realizing something, Hardy began to silently pack up the things on the table, ready to flee.

Noticing his movements, Lu Zhou asked, "Where are you going?"

The hand holding the backpack paused, and Hardy smiled awkwardly, "I... suddenly remembered that there are still a few documents that I haven't finished reading, so I have to go to the library."

"Helium is not poisonous, don't be so nervous," Lu Zhou sighed, and with his gloved hand, he brought the glass fiberglass cup to the window and put it in the sun.

In contrast, this thing is more dangerous.

If your fingers accidentally touched it, it would be light to freeze off a layer of skin.

After returning to the desk and sitting down, Lu Zhou suddenly thought of something, looked at Vera and said.

"Have you ever studied partial differential equations?"

After thinking about it for a moment, Vera nodded, but shook her head again, "I've studied it...but not much. Is there anything I can do for you?"

Lu Zhou thought for a while, then shook his head, "No, it's better to forget it, you continue the subject of hail conjecture."

Now there are only three people in the research group for Hailcon's conjecture. If Vera is taken away from the research group and only rely on Qin Yue and Hardy, he may never see the day when this research project is completed.

The little girl looked slightly disappointed.

Although I really want to help the professor.

But as expected, my ability is still not enough...

Suddenly thinking that there was another person in his office, Lu Zhou looked at Wei Wen who was sitting in the corner of the office, and kept glancing at him from time to time.

"Wei Wen, do you have any research on partial differential equations?"

As if he finally waited until the professor looked this way, Wei Wen pushed his glasses expressionlessly, but a smile appeared on the corner of his mouth.

"Yes, what's the matter?"

Partial differential equations is one of his areas of expertise besides functional analysis.

At the undergraduate level, he followed the professors of Yanda University and participated in similar research.

He has been in Princeton for so long, and now he finally has this opportunity to show his strengths.

For this day, he has prepared for too long.

He will use his strength to prove that he is the second strongest existence in this office!

Lu Zhou thought for a while and said, "I'm going to open another topic, about the NS equation."

The arc of the corner of the mouth gradually became stiff, especially after hearing the name NS Equation, the smile on Wei Wen's face... seemed to be less confident.

However, Lu Zhou didn't notice his expression.

What he needs most now is manpower, even if it can help a little, that would be good.

Of course, Wei Wen alone is not enough, even if his ability is outstanding enough, it is only compared to other graduate students.

Lightly tapping his index finger on the table, Lu Zhou, who was thinking about who else could help, suddenly lit up and sat up from the office chair.

"Yeah, why did you forget about that person..."

Whispering to himself, Lu Zhou's voice was a little excited.

If it was him, maybe he could really help me with this!

Tomorrow will continue to erupt~