The laser beams focus on the tiny gold cylinder, which contains a target the size of a BB. The target itself is a tiny hollow shell filled with the heavy hydrogen isotopes deuterium and tritium. When the lasers hit the target they'll generate a bath of X-rays, researchers say, that will rapidly heat the outside of the target. Its outer surface will explode while its inner core implodes, giving it 100 times the density of lead. The temperature inside the core will reach more than 100 million degrees Celsius and the pressure will be 100 billion times that of the Earth's atmosphere.

Then, researchers believe that the deuterium and tritium nuclei will fuse together to form a helium nucleus, releasing a burst of energy.