Anne White: A passion for plasma
Turbulence is an everyday phenomenon that we see in the curls of smoke rising from a fire or in the cream we stir into our morning coffee. But despite centuries of research, the details of how turbulent flows behave are still something of a mystery to scientists. Turbulence is also one of the most critical challenges remaining in the quest to make fusion, potentially a clean and almost limitless source of electricity, practical for generating power. Anne White, the Cecil and Ida Green Associate Professor in Nuclear Engineering in MIT’s Plasma Fusion and Science Center, has been fascinated by the complexities of turbulence, and its critical role in sapping power from fusion reactors, since she was an undergraduate. Since coming to MIT, where she earned tenure last year, she has made important progress toward unraveling aspects of that mystery. White grew up in the parched desert landscape of Yuma, Arizona, and completed...