The pioneers' legacy of inertial confinement nuclear fusion

• It is an original account on the history of inertial confinement nuclear fusion energy (ICF).
• It includes historical pictures that have not been published before.
• Madrid Manifesto was proposed by 180 scientists around the world.
• After declassification, several countries started research on ICF.
• ICF's challenge is to develop power plants that generate low cost, clean, inexhaustible energy.

Some years ago Professor Guillermo Velarde visited his good friend Academician Nicolai G. Basov, Nobel Prize in Physics and Director of the Lebedev Institute, and discussed the possibility of publishing a book on the History of the Inertial Confinement Nuclear fusion to be written by its Pioneers. They thought that only the own Pioneers could focus the book on a realistic and truthful manner.The years passed and unfortunately on July 1, 2001, Nicolai G. Basov passed away. In June 2002 Professor Velarde was invited to Moscow to give a Memorial lecture on Academician Basov in the Academy of Sciences. There in Moscow, Professors Vladislav Rozanov, Sergey Guskov, Natividad Carpintero-Santamaría and Guillermo Velarde decided to carry on with the project.Unfortunately, it was time to close the deadlines and the chapter of Academician Robert Dautray, former Haut-Commissaire of the CEA was not received. We regretted very much that the contribution of this very relevant Pioneer to the ICF is not included in the book. We did not receive also any material from Professor Edouard Fabre from the Ecole Polytechnique.The absence of the contributions of Nicolai G. Basov and Edward Teller was very significant. All of us would like that this ICENES 2013, hosted by the Institute of Nuclear Fusion, could be a posthumous tribute to these two outstanding Pioneers as well as a tribute to all of them.