Chapter 87: From Superconductivity to Helium-3

This new room-temperature superconducting material was passed into Qin Yu’s hands.

Holding the transparent container that held the sample of this material, he brought it to his eyes, and Qin Yu squinted to look.

At that moment, the material sample appeared as grey particles; since it wasn’t much in amount, under the light, it looked like some ordinary dust.

But these dust-like things were set to deeply affect the fate of Human Civilization.

In the Laboratory, amid the cheers and clapping of the group of core Researchers around, Qin Yu also smiled.

Even though, for the father of General Artificial Intelligence, this achievement only added another shine to his record,

counting the many victories in his long life, the birth of this superconductor material wasn’t that bright at this point.

But Qin Yu could still feel the pure sense of succeeding in finishing something not easy.

Finally,

the excited cheers over the birth of the new room-temperature superconducting material only paused at the Materials Research Institute part of the Negentropy Research Institute.

The authorities above chose not to reveal matters tied to the High-Power Laser Weapon, or the plan to slightly shift Asteroid 2801 using it to cut its power, avoiding too much pressure on Qin Yu and the Negentropy Research Institute.

Even inside the Negentropy Research Institute, the excited cheers for this new material didn’t go on long;

during the cheers, they eased a bit of the huge mental stress from this period, and it ended.

Because time was very tight now.

Developing the needed new superconducting material was just the first step in the next chain of tasks.

Next, the Negentropy Research Institute had to achieve Helium-3 Fusion by combining the new superconducting material with advances in other fields,

then join that with Helium-3 Fusion to finish the Lunar Surface High-Power Laser Weapon, and carry out the plan for it before the time window.

The Laser Weapon couldn’t be fired last, when Asteroid 2801 was nearly close;

if that happened, it wouldn’t just miss the target, but hitting it would do little good.

In theory, because the large laser weapon had to hit and cause some real impact,

the Laser Weapon should be fired sooner rather than later.

The best outcome in that, as Qin Yu had talked about with that Senior Leader before,

would make Asteroid 2801 give off less energy when it crashed into Earth.

To reach this best result required every piece of the plan to be perfect,

so the whole plan had almost no room for error.

The reason for trying this near-error-free plan was simple: if it couldn’t be done or failed, Human Civilization would lose nothing extra now.

Right then, inside the Negentropy Research Institute, Researchers from not just the Materials Research Institute but also the Energy and Power Research Institute and other teams elsewhere,

had no time to celebrate; under Qin Yu’s lead, they jumped into the next development work right away.

By the plan at the time,

the Laser Weapon needed to fire at least two months before the crash hit.

In the window from two to three months ahead, it was a good time to fire the weapon.

…

For this new superconductor material, the Researchers named it simply SWCD-281 material,

or more directly, SW281 material.

Theoretically, SW281 material’s arrival proved out Qin Yu’s earlier superconductor material theory,

and from that theory, finding SW281 should let them uncover more.

But for now, SW281 material was enough from an urgency view; looking into other room-temperature superconductors was for later.

Also, if Human Civilization was not in a Doomsday Crisis now,

room-temperature superconducting material would work not just in energy systems; big leaps in materials science often bring wide, full-spread changes.

But other uses would have to wait until after Human Civilization handled this Doomsday Crisis.

At present, with SW281 material born, the Negentropy Research Institute mostly focused on Helium-3 Fusion.

Once the Laboratory could make SW281 material, bigger amounts were much easier to create in this Intelligent Era.

After handing this task to Strong Artificial Intelligence from the Brain Intelligence Project, even by lab methods with current output,

they quickly produced enough SW281 material for Helium-3 Fusion research.

Relevant teams at the Materials Research Institute also kept pushing hard to better the way of mass-producing it.

For the overall Helium-3 Fusion Reactor study, led by Qin Yu, the Energy and Power Research Institute headed things at the Negentropy Research Institute.

After the earlier Controlled Nuclear Fusion commercial reactor project,

the institute drew in most top Researchers from the first Controlled Nuclear Fusion Experimental Reactor Project.

It gathered the best group of science staff in that area across Hmaxia Nation.

Under Qin Yu, Helium-3 Fusion Reactor work had gone on for years.

Though stuck before on some key issues,

it didn’t mean other parts of the large system weren’t making headway.

With Qin Yu guiding, besides the flow problem he fixed himself,

after Deuterium-Tritium Fusion, the full reactor study and its many systems had seen much buildup.

Now the material fix was done, and Qin Yu himself dove into solving several system-wide problems.

The Helium-3 Fusion Reactor creation pushed forward fast, like smashing the last barrier with unstoppable force.

After tries at Deuterium-Tritium Fusion,

the design of the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor that would truly fix Human Civilization’s energy needs for long,

or rather, the job of merging subsystem plans already done,

started right away once materials were set.

In the Intelligent Era,

the key for Researchers was to give a full design.

Actual build-out would be done by Strong Artificial Intelligence from the Brain Intelligence Project, using the design to run the Smart Industrial Cluster across Huaxia Nation.

This made it possible, in the scant time left, to try and finish the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor build before the end.

August.

7 months until Asteroid 2801 hit Earth.

Other parts of the High-Power Laser Weapon were already being built on the Lunar Surface.

Set in a bigger Crater than where the old lunar observer was,

the size of the full High-Power Laser Weapon was quite large.

Along the way, some wins from Negentropy Research Institute branches helped.

Older chemical rockets, with small leaps in propellants,

let the newest Earth-Moon mover rockets lift over 300 tons to the Lunar Surface.

Many Earth-Moon mover rockets were made by Strong Artificial Intelligence managing Smart Industrial Clusters far and wide, and they flowed non-stop to the Jiuzhou Launch Site.

The Jiuzhou Launch Site, which had been quiet for a while, got busy again during this period.

Important parts of the High-Power Laser Weapon were transported from Earth to the Lunar Surface.

With Strong Artificial Intelligence coordinating lunar-based Intelligent Machinery, the final assembly gradually took place inside the crater on the moon.

Next came the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor, the crucial power source for the high-power laser.

Even though many subsystems for the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor were already pre-developed,

designing and building the whole thing remained a massive, complex task.

But fortunately,

many researchers working on the project clearly noticed

that with Academician Qin Yu personally involved, progress rocketed forward.

Problems causing holdups got resolved quickly once he intervened.

It felt like he was single-handedly pulling the entire project forward at a crazy speed, way faster than normal.

Under this situation, many researchers became almost blindly trusting of Academician Qin Yu’s amazing research skills.

In quiet moments between research bursts,

researchers wondered if Academician Qin Yu already had the complete design for the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor crystal clear in his mind,

and was now just step-by-step making it real.

Driven by this absolute trust in Qin Yu, the entire Negentropy Research Institute ran incredibly efficiently.

Every day showed visible progress on the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor project.

…

September.

Six months left until Asteroid 2801 hit Earth.

Time was now critically short.

Even though the actual construction of the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor would be done by Strong Artificial Intelligence using the whole Smart Industrial Cluster system,

it still took time. You couldn’t just make a decent-sized Helium-3 Fusion Reactor instantly pop up on the moon, even in the Intelligent Era.

Also, there was no way to shift more resources to the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor, or the Laser Weapon plan in general.

Diverting too many resources would defeat the original purpose of starting the laser plan.

This Laser Weapon plan couldn’t stop Asteroid 2801 from hitting Earth anyway.

People couldn’t, and wouldn’t, pin most of their hopes on it.

Based on current and earlier plans, the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor design HAD to be finished this month.

This was to give the Strong Artificial Intelligence enough time to move Intelligent Machinery and actually build the reactor.

During this month,

helped by just barely sufficient transport capacity,

other major parts of the High-Power Laser Weapon were set up one after another.

For the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor, modules and subsystems locked in as final in the design

had their production tasks sent out by the Strong Artificial Intelligence in the Brain Intelligence Project to relevant smart factories across the industrial chain to begin manufacturing.

Honestly, time was very tight,

but in the end, led by Qin Yu, the Negentropy Research Institute got it done without waiting until the absolute last minute.

Just days after September began,

the research and design for the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor were completed.

…

The Helium-3 Fusion Reactor project was huge,

involving a complex system with many specialized branches.

The Deuterium-Tritium Fusion Reactor seemed crazy complex already,

but the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor, requiring even more demanding fusion conditions, was another level.

Designing the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor

wasn’t just about brilliance; often it came down to pure workload.

Even with the whole Negentropy Research Institute and multiple teams helping Qin Yu by tackling smaller subsystems and minor design details,

the sheer effort Qin Yu poured into this project far exceeded almost anything he’d done before.

Now,

in a Laboratory, the last critical problem holding up the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor design was solved.

Qin Yu closed his eyes. He could almost see a virtual, complete, incredibly detailed Helium-3 Fusion Reactor humming away in his mind.

Most of the major hurdles were truly overcome now.

What remained were just minor, peripheral issues.

He didn’t even need to solve these; the remaining researchers on the team could handle them quickly.

So,

naturally,

by mid-September,

the project provided the Strong Artificial Intelligence within the Brain Intelligence Project with a complete production and build plan for the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor, broken down by system and module.

The Strong Artificial Intelligence then assigned production tasks to various smart factories and Intelligent Industrial Clusters.

This started the manufacturing of all the equipment, devices, structures, and materials needed upstream and downstream for building the reactor.

At the same time, transport from Earth to the Lunar Surface kicked off.

Although Qin Yu and the team had squeezed the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor down as much as possible during design,

its size, while significantly smaller than a Deuterium-Tritium reactor, was still absolutely large.

Chemical rockets of this era couldn’t lift the entire reactor structure to the moon in one piece.

So, the entire structure would have to be built on the moon,

piece by piece, by Intelligent Machinery,

just like the Laser Weapon.

…

October.

With the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor officially entering the construction phase,

researchers from the Negentropy Research Institute in related fields found themselves with little to do.

The Strong Artificial Intelligence was strictly following the design to build the reactor.

The researchers really couldn’t intervene, nor was there any need for them to do so.

For now, what they could do was continue other research related to surviving the apocalypse

and wait for the reactor construction on the Lunar Surface to finish.

Once built, they needed to see the test run results.

If the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor test didn’t go well – failure, or energy output below target –

then the whole plan would end right there.

Human Civilization wouldn’t have enough time to build a whole new reactor before the asteroid hit.

But if the test run looked good,

then up next was the final outcome of the High-Power Laser Weapon plan, fueled by that helium reactor.

Naturally, all the researchers involved at the Negentropy Research Institute felt heavy pressure during this time.

They anxiously watched the Strong Artificial Intelligence report the Helium-3 Fusion Reactor construction progress.

This month,

with less than five months left before Asteroid 2801’s arrival,

most Underground Shelter Cities across the Huaxia Nation were nearing completion.

Society as a whole kept running fast, full of tension.

For many citizens,

the progress on the final batch of Underground Shelter cities – those still midway through construction or even just starting – was the most critical focus now.