The energy we get from the Sun is generated at its core in fusion reactions, in which hydrogen is turned into helium. If these reactions could be used on Earth, humanity would be able to provide itself with an abundance of energy. The problem of maintaining practical nuclear fusion has been one of the central problems of physics forsome thirty years, and yet only now has it become clear that a solution is in fact possible. This book explains in a lively andinformal way how the investigations have developed, the cleverness of the ideas used to tackle the problems, the ingenuity behind theexperiments, and the successes and setbacks encountered in dea ing with the capricious and cunning material we call plasma.Intended for teachers, college students, and school pupils.