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Asked by lisaloo to Claire, Matt, Rob, Sam on 26 Jun 2013.
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Sam Geen answered on 26 Jun 2013:
Fission is big atoms breaking apart, fusion is small atoms merging together!
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Robert Woolfson answered on 26 Jun 2013:
Fission is what powers nuclear reactions. Fusion is what powers the sun. Fusion is a lot more powerful but requires incredibly intense conditions (millions of degrees of heat) to work, which is why we have fission reactions but not fusion reactors.
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Matthew Pankhurst answered on 26 Jun 2013:
You put the little ones in, you get big ones out, you put those big ones back in aaand you shake them all about…. is my summary of fusion, then fission… I remember it by fusion (the little ones get fused together), and fission (the split up to go about their mission)
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Claire Lee answered on 26 Jun 2013:
With fusion you go up the periodic table, and with fission you go down it 🙂
There is a “turning point” at Iron – for elements before iron, you get energy out with fusion (you have to supply energy in to break the atoms apart with fusion).
For elements after iron, you get energy out from fission, and you have to put energy in if you want to do fusion.
This is the reason stars explode!!
A star only lives for as long as the energy it produces can withstand the gravity pulling itself in. As a star burns, it converts hydrogen to helium etc etc with fusion, up the periodic table. Eventually it has a big component of iron in its core. The trouble comes when it needs to use that iron for energy, so it tries to use fusion (because that’s all it can do)
But then it needs to supply some energy to fuse iron, so now the star is losing energy rather than gaining it. As a result it can’t withstand the gravitational force on itself, collapses, and then explodes!
cool huh?
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