UT Austin-Led Fusion Research Team Wins Google.org AI Award

Researchers led by the University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin) have been selected to receive three years of funding and support under Google.org's AI for Science Impact Challenge. The project aims to accelerate fusion energy research using artificial intelligence.

Project Scope and Partners

Led by Joshua Burby, assistant professor in the Department of Physics, the team is among 17 organizations selected to share a total of $36 million in funding from Google.org.

The project also includes faculty from the College of Natural Sciences, the Department of Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Mechanics, and the Oden Institute for Computational Engineering and Sciences.

Stellarator Designs and Artificial Intelligence

Resembling twisted donut shapes, stellarators stand out as a promising reactor design for generating abundant, carbon-free fusion energy.

Due to their complex structures, which are difficult and costly to test using computer simulations, the team will develop surrogate models that will accelerate and cheapen iterative calculations.

Future Fusion Power Plants

These developed models are expected to lower construction costs for future fusion power plants and make research processes economical.

The project, which also involves collaborators from the University of Washington and New York University, reinforces the institute's leadership in the field of scientific machine learning.