The world's most powerful centrifuge was activated in China this week according to SCMP reports. The Centrifugal Centrifugal Hypergravity and Interdisciplinary Experiment Facility (CHIEF) located in Hangzhou can generate up to 1900 gravity pulls when fully operational. It bypasses the US Army Corps of Engineers centrifuge which can only generate 1,200 gravitational pulls.
There are three CHIEF twins to be built with it equipped with six chambers to generate hypergravity force when rotating. Hypergravity pressure is used in material studies, geological processes, deep sea mining, earth seismic studies and material processing. Construction began in 2020 with the entire facility expected to be completed next year.
Among the studies that will be started is how to extract gas hydrate from the ocean floor which is under high pressure. Before the actual exploration is done, the technique can be tested using a centrifuge. Hypergravity can also test the effects of pressure on the dam for several close-ups in just a few hours.
CHIEF is included in China's 13th Five-Year Plan (2016–2020) as one of the ten major scientific infrastructures with an investment amounting to over RMB 2 billion (~RM 1.23 billion).