Math student builds fusion reactor at home with help from Claude AI and $2,000

A math student built a fusion reactor at home with $2,000 and help from Claude AI over four weeks, achieving plasma but not full fusion.

: Hudhayfa Nazoordeen, a math student at the University of Waterloo, spent $2,000 and four weeks building a mini fusion reactor in his bedroom. He achieved plasma using a 12kV neon sign transformer but didn't reach full nuclear fusion. His efforts were aided by Claude 3.5 AI and support from other engineers. Olivia Li from the University of Toronto praised his accomplishments.

Hudhayfa Nazoordeen, a mathematics major at the University of Waterloo, spent $2,000 and four weeks to build a mini fusion reactor in his bedroom. Despite having no previous hardware experience, he successfully produced plasma using a setup powered by a 12kV neon sign transformer but did not achieve full nuclear fusion.

During the project, Nazoordeen invested the first week sourcing parts, and subsequent weeks assembling the reactor and figuring out vacuum system intricacies. His perseverance paid off as he reached a vacuum of 25 millionths of an atmosphere, although he admitted that sealing numerous tiny leaks was particularly challenging.

He credited significant support from engineers on his campus as well as valuable assistance from Anthropic's Claude 3.5 AI chatbot. While full-scale fusion was not achieved, Olivia Li from the University of Toronto praised Nazoordeen's accomplishment, encouraging others interested in such projects.

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