Fusion Energy Base Newsletter #17

November 12th, 2026

Affiliate Spotlight: Borealis Fusion: Designing a Power Plant from the Fuel Outward

We sat down with Ian Ochs, co-founder and CTO of Borealis Fusion, the New York-based company designing a fusion power plant around proton-boron-11 (pB11) fuel. Its machine concept, PRISM (pB11 Rotating Ion Separation Mirror), is derived from the tandem mirror and adapted to the fuel's requirements, and a $6 million seed round funds an integrated physics assessment and a costed design for a first experimental campaign. Ochs makes the case that pB11's stable, nonradioactive fuel, lack of a tritium fuel cycle, and much lower neutron output could make the plant simpler and cheaper, in service of the company's mission to make fusion the lowest-cost source of firm electricity.

ARPA-E's Impact on Fusion Human Capital

As a 2026 ARPA-E Summer Scholar, Brendan Massoud traced the 157 people who worked on ARPA-E's ALPHA fusion program to see where their careers went next. ALPHA alumni have since joined 23 private fusion organizations, including seven of the 12 highest-funded in the U.S., and counting ARPA-E's other fusion programs, the agency has funded or trained people at 11 of those 12. Principal investigators and later-career scientists were the most likely to stay in private fusion, while postdocs and PhD students more often moved to national labs, universities, or work outside fusion. More than 95% of the people funded stayed at organizations in the U.S.

Trends in Fusion Hiring: November 2026 Update

Fusion job openings are at a new high. As of November 12 there were 887 open positions on our jobs board, up about 8% from mid-October and 43% from mid-March. Part of the rise is seasonal, with open internship postings nearly doubling from 31 to 60. Commonwealth Fusion Systems still leads with 136 open roles, and Xcimer Energy (65) has edged past Helion Energy (64) into second place. Electrical engineering (136) has passed physics (132) as the largest single category.

Affiliate News: Peak Nano Expands U.S. Capacitor Film Production 20-Fold

Peak Nano is expanding production of its NanoPlex HDC capacitor film 20-fold with a new line in Macedonia, Ohio, adding up to three million pounds of annual capacity when it reaches full production in early 2028. Peak Nano names fusion among its target markets and is hiring technicians now, with a job fair on November 21.

New User-Added Listings

Three more organizations have joined Fusion Energy Base and built out their pages since our last issue.

Photron, which makes high-speed camera systems for plasma physics and other fast phenomena, listed itself under high-speed cameras and plasma diagnostics, added six locations across the U.S., the UK, Germany, Japan, Thailand, and China, and added nine products to the product directory, including the FASTCAM Orion and the Pharsighted E9 Series, which records at up to 2.72 million frames per second.
SuperMatics, an early-stage Berkeley startup, builds AI to find superconductors that can be made into practical wire and tape for uses such as fusion magnets. It listed itself under materials modeling software and added its co-founders.
Pensievision, based in Rochester, New York, combines a miniaturized single-lens setup, AI, and liquid lens optics for high-precision 3D imaging in tight or complex environments. It added its leadership team and three locations.
Established listings are growing too. Hind Plant & Machinery, which has worked in the capacitor industry since 1992 and helps establish capacitor manufacturing lines, added a profile.

If your organization is not yet listed on Fusion Energy Base you can add it free of charge. If it's already listed, click the "Edit Page" button on the organization detail page to claim and edit it.

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