tonne hypergravity machine compresses space, time
Interesting Engineering••science
Key Points:
- China has set a new record in hypergravity research by completing CHIEF1900, the world’s most powerful centrifuge capable of simulating 1900 g-tonnes, surpassing the previous CHIEF1300 model launched just months earlier.
- Built by Shanghai Electric Nuclear Power Group for Zhejiang University’s CHIEF facility, CHIEF1900 enables scientists to study the effects of extreme gravitational forces on materials and structures, compressing space and time to simulate long-term phenomena in a laboratory setting.
- The centrifuge allows scaled-down models to experience stresses equivalent to much larger real-world structures, aiding research in fields such as environmental science, civil engineering, and pollutant migration over millennia.
- The CHIEF facility, located 15 meters underground
