When Peng Juexian drove back to the Cardashe Research Center from the consulate, the morning sun of Provence had already risen slowly from the indigo sky.

He rolled down the car window and let the morning breeze with the salty and humid smell of the Mediterranean flow into his collar, which finally managed to dispel his strong sleepiness.

Fang Jianming, who was sitting on the other side of the aisle, turned to look at Peng Juexian who was yawning, and asked worriedly:

"Academician Peng, there is about an hour and a half left before the meeting starts. Do you want to find a room in the venue to rest?"

As the head of the delegation, Peng Juexian has hardly slept since receiving the report the day before yesterday.

Considering that it was bound to be another stressful confrontation, Fang Jianming couldn't help but start to worry about the other party's physical condition.

"The materials provided by Academician Chang are a bit obscure. I have to sort out the PPT before the meeting starts, otherwise the audience may not be able to understand it in a short time..."

Peng Juexian shook his head, and then asked in a half-joking tone:

"Why, are you worried that I'll fall asleep during the meeting later?"

Although he tried his best to hide the tiredness on his face, one could still hear that his voice was a little hoarse.

"Not really... I'm just worried that you won't have the energy to argue with the scholars later."

Fang Jianming also changed his tone to a relatively relaxed one.

"Do not worry."

Peng Juexian smiled:

"According to the current agenda, we are the second to go on stage after France, which is equivalent to directly confronting Robert Hull... I guess after our two reports are finished, there will be a debate among the delegations of various countries. So even if there is a debate, it cannot be today."

After he finished speaking, he glanced down at the briefcase on his lap.

The document that Chang Haonan sent to him was now lying inside, like a nuclear bomb about to explode.

"By the way, Lao Fang."

After a few seconds of silence, perhaps in order to stay awake by using his facial muscles, Peng Juexian took the initiative to speak:

"Remember to arrange a seat for Huang Zhitao during the meeting today."

The EU is considered a whole when signing a formal agreement, but each party works independently during meetings, so the entire meeting includes delegations from more than a dozen countries, and the number of people allowed to enter each meeting is limited.

Except for a few key roles, other members can only participate in turns.

As the last member, Huang Zhitao would not have been arranged to attend such an important occasion in the first place, even though he was Peng Juexian's student.

Therefore, Fang Jianming was stunned when he heard this request:

"Xiao Huang's contribution this time is indeed huge, and he deserves special attention...but the list of names has been confirmed in advance, and it's not easy to delete other people..."

For a moment he even considered whether the other party was hinting at kicking him out.

But after thinking about it, I feel that the possibility is not high.

First of all, the relationship between the two of them is pretty good, and there have never been any unpleasant things.

Secondly, as of now, only the three of them are aware of the fact that a second version of the speech was produced temporarily...

In fact, Peng Juexian was simply a little sleepy, and his brain's multi-threaded processing ability was a little off. He only reacted after being reminded:

"Or let him be responsible for the meeting minutes... Conference secretaries don't need to be particularly professional, and they are considered administrative staff of the delegation, so they won't mind taking two more days off..."

Fang Jianming originally wanted to say that secretaries also need certain shorthand skills, but then he thought that the focus today should only be Robert Hull and Peng Juexian, and the Japanese delegation in third place might not even get a turn to speak, so there should be no problem.

"Okay, I'll arrange it..."

……

An hour and a half later.

Representatives from various countries entered the venue one after another amid the melodious celebratory march.

The Japanese delegation, accompanied by Director Morita of the Tokyo Institute of Quantum Research, walked quickly through the side door, even deliberately avoiding direct communication with the French delegation.

The American was talking quietly with the Russian representative, while Dr. Kim Ki-min from the South Korean team nodded to Peng Juexian from a distance...

"Teacher Fang, when it comes to the technical and theoretical parts later, if we don't have time to type the symbols, can we write them down on paper first?"

Huang Zhitao huddled in the second row of the Chinese delegation, holding his laptop, his fingers tapping unconsciously on the keyboard, his gaze shifting from the glowing ITER logo on the dome of the main conference hall to the two team leaders in the front row.

Although he had been wondering these past two days whether his previous performance could gain extraordinary favor.

But I never expected that I would be placed in such an important position from being an unknown member of the delegation and an academic locust.

For a moment, I even felt a little at a loss.

Fang Jianming turned his head helplessly and explained:

"We will record the technical and theoretical parts. What you need to do is to record the reactions and main points of the speeches of the delegations from various countries and keep them on file after returning home in case they are useful in the future. As for the content of the report on the stage, a title is enough... But you can also add a summary to practice your ability to extract key information by yourself, which will also be useful for independent research in the future."

In fact, these words are enough to show how much importance Huang Zhitao is receiving nowadays.

However, he himself was still in a state of surprise and confusion...

Internal meetings do not require so much formality. After a simple opening and announcement, Robert Hull, as the host representative, took the lead and stepped onto the podium.

"First, let me report to you on the research progress of the ITER project so far..."

The tie of this French academician was slightly more crooked than yesterday, and the beam of light from the projector just happened to illuminate the dark circles under his eyes. It was obvious that he had not had enough rest in the past few days.

When the PPT turned to the red bar graph of "Plasma Maintenance Time Bottleneck", Peng Juexian noticed that Yasuhiro Morita, who was sitting diagonally opposite him, sat up slightly straighter.

"...After three months of continuous experiments, we confirmed that when the duration exceeds the critical threshold of 500-550 seconds, the amplitude of the core disturbance will increase exponentially."

Hull clicked the mouse, and a 3D animation simulated by the monitoring data began to play.

The dark blue plasma was like the surface of the sea in a storm. It seemed calm with just regular ups and downs one second, but the next second spider-web-like cracks suddenly erupted from the core, causing the entire plasma to break outwards in a short time.

At the same time, the readings of peripheral sensors exploded, indicating that energy and particles were erupting from the inside out.

"We have used some means to change the time point when large-scale sawtooth collapse occurs, but given the current hardware conditions, it is basically impossible to break through the bottleneck of 580 seconds..."

Hull pointed to the oscillation curve on the graph and said:

“This is also one of the core motivations for ToreSupra to upgrade the WEST project.”

There was a suppressed commotion in the audience.

Although the sawtooth oscillation phenomenon was first observed as early as 1974, since then, the plasma collapse that may be caused by the intensification of oscillations has become a concern in fusion research in various countries.

However, most facilities have not yet had such experience due to issues with stable operation duration or plasma scale.

The conclusions reached by the French through experiments are obviously much more serious than everyone's previous estimates.

Dr. White from the US delegation suddenly raised his hand and said, "So the requirement for the plasma to last 500 seconds at a time in the first phase of ITER is a conservative estimate based on your data?"

"That's not true."

Hull shook his head and switched to the next slide:

"When the 98-second target was set in 500, the running time of ToreSupra had just exceeded the 350-second mark, so it was completely a coincidence..."

The discussion below became noticeably noisier.

As mentioned earlier, compared to the ITER reactor itself, which is nowhere in sight, countries are more concerned about the help that Europe's existing research facilities can provide.

The problem with ToreSupra doesn’t seem to be something that can be solved with a simple upgrade…

Hull deliberately let the tension ferment for a while before changing the subject and speaking again:

"However, there is no need to worry too much about the progress of WEST's upgrade. We have combined the operating data of ToreSupra with the most authoritative partial magnetic reconnection model currently available, and combined with the theoretical support of Japanese colleagues, we have determined that the two parts that have the greatest impact on the sawtooth behavior are auxiliary heating and neutral particle beam injection."

"It is well known that tooth collapse is caused by the triggering of the M=1 mode, so first of all, a macroscopic driver related to the effective potential energy function is required..."

"..."

Next, he spent about 40 minutes explaining the quasi-exchange mode instability under the incomplete magnetic reconnection model, and finally mentioned the principle of controlling sawtooth oscillation:

"The above stability threshold can be used to analyze the data control through fast ion, neutral beam injection or thermonuclear reaction and various current drives. With sufficient operation data, as long as the position of the q=1 plane is accurately measured, the position of neutron beam injection can be accurately located and the most suitable plasma preheating temperature can be found..."

"..."

After finishing the main content, Hull paused for a while to allow the audience to understand and digest it.

Of course, even if most of the participants were experienced researchers, it would be impossible for them to judge whether what he said was correct or not in such a short period of time. At most, they could only sort out a relatively smooth logic.

And at least in engineering, this logic is impeccable.

"I know that it is not easy to accurately measure the position of the q=1 surface, and neutral beam injection also requires a large external power input, but it at least provides a theoretical way to completely solve the risk of plasma collapse."

Hull pressed the laser pointer, and a red arrow pierced into the device structure diagram that had just appeared on the screen:

"Therefore, WEST will focus on upgrading the neutral beam injection and low-hybrid wave heating systems, and it is expected that the maintenance time will be increased to about 800 seconds within two years..."

After his report, the entire conference room burst into warm applause, led by the Japanese delegation.

If nothing else, the plan to increase maintenance time by 60% within two years deserves such treatment.

Even Fang Jianming and Peng Juexian clapped their hands a few times.

They knew that the French goal should be achievable.

But because of the wrong theoretical starting point, it does not have greater potential...

With Hull's example, the reaction in the venue had become much colder when Peng Juexian took the stage.

It’s not that I have any opinion about Peng Juexian himself or the Chinese delegation.

The truth is that I have just consumed a lot of passion, and now I need to buffer it.

After all, although China's Oriental Super Ring has made rapid progress, it is still not as dazzling as the old ToreSupra and JT60U.

Not to mention the upgraded WEST.

However, the first two sentences Peng Juexian said after he took the stage directly changed the atmosphere of the entire meeting.

"Dear delegates and Academician Robert Hull, the topic of my report today is also related to the sawtooth collapse phenomenon."

"We have found sufficient theoretical evidence to show that the partial magnetic reconnection model used to describe the sawtooth oscillations over the past decade... is mechanistically incomplete!"