ºÚÁÏÉçapp

?In its April issue, the newsletter from the Institute of Plasma Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (ASIPP) focuses on KTX, the reverse pinch machine that came into existence on 30 March. The mission of KTX is to explore the plasma profiles of future commercial fusion reactors. "KTX will produce its first plasma in June," says Pr. Liu Wandong, chief engineering director and dean of the Modern Physics Department at University of Science and Technology of China.

Read more in the _Do_KTX.pdf_DoX_April issue _Dx_of the ASIPP Newsletter.

?The 12th Workshop on Beryllium Technology will be held from 10 to 12 September 2015 on Jeju Island, South Korea. The objective of this workshop is to disseminate results of research and technology development in areas relevant to beryllium utilization in nuclear power systems, both fission and fusion.   Click _Do_BeWS-12.pdf_DoX_ here_Dx_ for more information on the program.  

?After two years of intense maintenance and consolidation, and several months of preparation for restart, the  (LHC), the most powerful particle accelerator in the world, is back in operation. On 5 April at 10:41 a.m., a proton beam was back in the 27-kilometre ring, followed at 12:27 p.m. by a second beam rotating in the opposite direction. These beams circulated at their injection energy of 450 GeV. Over the coming days, operators will check all systems before increasing energy of the beams.

"Operating accelerators for the benefit of the physics community is what CERN's here for," said CERN Director-General Rolf Heuer. "Today, CERN's heart beats once more to the rhythm of the LHC."  

"The return of beams to the LHC rewards a lot of intense, hard work from many teams of people," said the head of CERN's Beam Department, Paul Collier. "It's very satisfying for our operators to be back in the driver's seat, with what's effectively a new accelerator to bring on-stream, carefully, step by step."

The technical stop of the LHC was a Herculean task. Some 10,000 electrical interconnections between the magnets were consolidated. Magnet protection systems were added, while cryogenic, vacuum and electronics were improved and strengthened. Furthermore, the beams will be set up in such a way that they will produce more collisions by bunching protons closer together, with the time separating bunches being reduced from 50 nanoseconds to 25 nanoseconds.

Read more on the  website.

By Raphael Rosen, Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory

NASA's  (MMS), a set of four spacecraft that will study the magnetic fields surrounding Earth, may employ data provided by Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL), which operates the Magnetic Reconnection Experiment (MRX)¡ªthe world's leading laboratory facility for studying reconnection. Results of the MRX research could elucidate the space probes' findings, said Masaaki Yamada, principal investigator of the MRX project.

Reconnection takes place when the magnetic field lines in plasma merge and snap apart with violent force. But NASA is flying blind in a sense when seeking such events, since mission operators don't know precisely where reconnection will occur in space or what the data it produces will look like. And since the explosive events occur in milliseconds, the MMS craft, orbiting in tight formation at an average speed of some 20,000 miles per hour, will have only fleeting moments to detect and measure the phenomena.

The MRX data could facilitate such detection. Comparing the data with signals from space will enable instruments aboard the craft to spot actual instances of reconnection taking place.

Read more on the  website.

?When ºÚÁÏÉçapp scientists needed to simulate how particles travel and transport radiation in the ºÚÁÏÉçapp machine, they bought time in one of the most powerful supercomputers in Europe: , the flagship machine of the Barcelona Supercomputing Centre (BSC).

The collaboration with the Spanish public institution, whose 10th anniversary was celebrated on 1 April, has now shifted to simulation studies of ELM control techniques ¡ª another field of study that requires crunching huge quantities of numbers.

High performance computing has become essential to the progress of science and technology. With close to 50,000 processors and a computing power of one thousand billion operations per second, Mare Nostrum has contributed to establishing three-dimensional maps of the galaxy, mathematical models of the expansion rate of the Universe, the sequencing of the human genome...

In a video address to the participants of the 10th anniversary ceremony, ºÚÁÏÉçapp Director-General Bernard Bigot stressed the importance of BSC's contribution to ºÚÁÏÉçapp.

ºÚÁÏÉçapp and the Spanish institution have crossed ways many times: former ºÚÁÏÉçapp Deputy-Director Carlos Alejaldre was part of BSC's executive board in the mid-2000s and, more recently, one of the ºÚÁÏÉçapp Monaco Postdoctoral Fellows joined BSC's computational physics group, bringing with him the valuable experience he gained while at ºÚÁÏÉçapp.

Collaboration in European fusion research has a long history. In 1961, the Max Plank Institute of Plasma Physics became an associate of the European Fusion Programme, which comprised the fusion laboratories of the European Union and Switzerland. In the 1970s, the European fusion laboratories decided to build and operate the Joint European Torus (JET). In 2014, the program was restructured and EUROfusion formed as a consortium of 29 national fusion laboratories (Research Units).

A goal of this reorganization is to efficiently implement a roadmap to the realization of fusion energy. The roadmap has been developed within a goal-oriented approach articulated in eight different missions (#8 focuses on the stellarator). It also prioritizes the financing of the fusion program.   In mission 8, the stellarator is being developed as an alternative concept for fusion electricity. The program concentrates on optimized stellarators based on the HELIAS principle¡ªa stellarator line which was invented and developed at IPP. Wendelstein 7-X is a cornerstone of this line which is decisive for mission 8 and which will give answers to fundamental questions in plasma physics.     Read more in the Wendelstein 7-X March .

?The ºÚÁÏÉçapp is hosting an Industrial Information Day on 21 May 2015 to present the scope and the procurement program of the ºÚÁÏÉçapp assembly and installation phase.

The full-day event will include overview presentations on the management of the planned work scope, tender rules and regulations, and presentations on specific work contracts.

See the Business Events page to register on line before 8 May 2015.

The European Physical Society (EPS) has named Princeton physicist Nat Fisch winner of the 2015 Hannes Alfv¨¦n Prize, awarded for outstanding contributions to plasma physics.

Director of the Princeton Program in Plasma Physics and professor and associate chair of astrophysical sciences at Princeton University, Fisch received the prize for fundamental studies of wave-particle interactions and for predicting new plasma phenomena, including new ways of creating electrical currents using radio-frequency waves. [...] Fisch has been studying waves in plasmas for years and in many different contexts. "the problem of using waves to transform energy in plasma from one form to another is one I returned to again and again during my career," he said. In addition to pursuing how wave effects might make fusion energy practical, he is currently researching how to use plasma to reach the next generation of laser beam intensities.
Read the full article .

?One of the biggest challenges facing fusion physicists is controlling the plasma inside a tokamak reactor.

 

Plasma ¡ª a gas of the fuels that are heated to start the fusion process ¡ª is difficult to keep stable, and seeks to escape the magnetic field that confines it within the machine. This results in 'instabilities' which make the plasma wobble and fluctuate, taking energy away from it and affecting the tokamak's performance.

  Decades of research on tokamak experiments worldwide has led to a deep understanding of a myriad of different plasma instabilities with exotic names (from Edge Localised Modes to Tearing Modes, Kink instabilities and Sawteeth). Just as importantly, researchers are developing methods to stop them occurring, reduce their effect or stabilise them altogether.   Amongst all these challenges has been the fact that most of these instabilities, certainly those deep inside the plasma, are invisible to high-speed camera videos ¡ª until now, that is. University of York PhD student David Ryan is currently working at Culham Centre for Fusion Energy and he applied cutting-edge video magnification techniques to footage of plasmas in the to see what would emerge.   Read more on website

?Think science and art are poles apart? Think again. Three artists who have been inspired by nuclear fusion will display their work at the  "Making a Sun on Earth"' exhibition, which runs at the Cornerstone Arts Centre in Didcot, UK from 10 March to 26 April. And they hope their collaboration with Culham Centre for Fusion Energy will challenge people's ideas about science.

Find out more .

?The next Fusion Summer University at the Max-Planck-Institute for Plasma Physics (IPP)will be held in Garching (near Munich) from 14 to 18 September 2015. The course covers the main aspects of plasma physics with emphasis on nuclear fusion.

The application deadline 31 May 2015. For more information please click .

 

A few years before ºÚÁÏÉçapp is due to come into operation, the advanced superconducting "satellite" tokamak JT-60SA, conducted under the Broader Approach Agreement between Japan and Europe, will begin operation. 

Another milestone on the road to assembly was achieved in February, as six European-built helium pressure vessels¡ªdestined for JT-60SA's cryogenic system¡ªsuccessfully passed final works acceptance tests and can now be readied for shipment to Japan.

The acceptance tests, which consisted of verifications to ensure that the components conform to international standards and to ensure that there are no defects, was carried out during a period of seven days each.

In total, the six pressure vessels will store 3.6 tons of gaseous helium. Each 22-metre pressure vessel weighs about 73 tons, and has a diameter of 4 metres and a volume of 250 m3. As the vessels will store pure helium, the tightness and cleanliness requirements are demanding. If a fast discharge of the current in the superconducting coils is necessary, one of the vessels is also designed to receive cold helium (-254 degrees C) discharged from the coils through the cryogenic system quench line.

The contract for the supply and transport to Japan of the pressure vessels and their equipment was awarded by the European Domestic Agency to A. Silva Matos Metalomecanica SA (ASMM, Portugal).

Read the full article on the European Domestic Agency .

 

?Knowledge is not cheap. The world spends more than $1 trillion a year on research and development, including basic research. The biggest projects¡ª"research infrastructures" like particle accelerators and DNA databases¡ªcarry correspondingly big price tags.
ºÚÁÏÉçapp, the experimental, international fusion reactor in the south of France, is taking years and more than EUR 13 billion to build. The Square Kilometre Array, the world's biggest radio telescope now under development in South Africa and other southern countries, will cost well more than EUR 1.5 billion   It's all great science, no doubt. But is it a great investment?     Read the from Science|Business, prefaced by Rolf Heuer, Director-General, CERN.

?Culham Centre for Fusion Energy (CCFE) is one of the partners in a materials research project that has recently been awarded significant European funding.

The project will explore techniques that can accurately examine engineering components at a range of sizes and scales ¡ª right down to the nanoscale analysis carried out in Culham's Materials Research Laboratory (MRL).

To get a consistent picture of the properties of a material, researchers need to examine it at different length scales. This new study will look at how changing the specimen size or the size of the probe used for testing affects the measured engineering properties. Test methods or design rules can then be developed that compensate for such 'size effects.'

It is hoped that European companies can use the results to design and manufacture better components with longer life and lower energy use. The work will also benefit the fusion and fission research sectors, where smaller samples represent less of a safety risk when examining the condition of components.

Led by the , the project consortium brings together major industry players such as EDF, AMEC, AWE and Tata Steel with universities and research institutes around Europe. The grant of ~EUR 1.8 million has been made by European Association of National Metrology Institutes (EURAMET).

Read more on the  website.

?The of Fusion for Energy newsletter is now online. Find out how contractors feel about ºÚÁÏÉçapp's business potential, read about top management changes in Barcelona, catch up on design reviews and more.

Operators at EAST, the Chinese superconducting tokamak, announced in the February issue of the EAST Newsletter that the auxiliary heating system has passed a national acceptance review and is officially stamped "well qualified" to enter operation.

Construction on the auxiliary heating system, which consists of 4 MW neutral beam injectors and 6 MW lower hybrid current drives, began in November 2011. The additional heating power on EAST will enable high-level plasma physics research including testing for ºÚÁÏÉçapp.

The acceptance panel commended the construction, complete "with high quality, within budget and one year ahead of schedule."

Aiming at long-pulse plasma discharges, a series of experimental techniques has been developed on EAST in recent years. Tremendous efforts have been made during past two years to enhance EAST's capabilities¡ªnearly every sub-system except superconducting magnets has been upgraded or modified to enable higher performance and truly steady state operation.

Read the full article in the February issue of the EAST Newsletter, attached.

On 3 February 2015, FuseNet (the European Fusion Education Network) and ENEN (the European Nuclear Education Network) signed a Memorandum of Understanding at the General Assembly meeting of FuseNet that was held at the Culham Centre for Fusion Energy. It marked the start for further cooperation between the European fusion and fission education networks.   ENEN is older than FuseNet, but similar in many ways. As the nuclear aspects of fusion energy become more prominent -- ºÚÁÏÉçapp is truly a nuclear device -- the need to provide fusion students and engineers with proper education and training in this field becomes ever larger. Likewise, nuclear engineers are in high demand in the fusion enterprises now, and they may benefit from a fusion training.   Prof. Walter Ambrosini (president of ENEN, left) and Prof. Niek Lopes Cardozo (president of FuseNet, right) sign the Memorandum of Understanding between the two networks.

 

Read more on the  website.

?February 11, 2015 marks five years in space for NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO), which provides incredibly detailed images of the whole sun 24 hours a day. Capturing an image more than once per second, SDO has provided an unprecedentedly clear picture of how massive explosions on the sun grow and erupt ever since its launch on Feb. 11, 2010. The imagery is also captivating, allowing one to watch the constant ballet of solar material through the sun's atmosphere, the corona. 

In honor of SDO's fifth anniversary, NASA has released a video showcasing highlights from the last five years of sun watching. Watch the movie to see giant clouds of solar material hurled out into space, the dance of giant loops hovering in the corona, and huge sunspots growing and shrinking on the sun's surface. 

The imagery is an example of the kind of data that SDO provides to scientists. By watching the sun in different wavelengths ¡ª and therefore different temperatures ¡ª scientists can watch how material courses through the corona, which holds clues to what causes eruptions on the sun, what heats the sun's atmosphere up to 1,000 times hotter than its surface, and why the sun's magnetic fields are constantly on the move.

View the on the NASA website.

?The ºÚÁÏÉçapp Business Forum 2015 (IBF/15) will take place in Marseille, France from 25 to 27 March 2015.

Already, close to 400 participants from 200 companies have registered to participate. (A real-time update is available .)

The agenda is now finalized and includes 14 theme workshops bringing together more than one hundred speakers from the ºÚÁÏÉçapp, the procurement agencies for ºÚÁÏÉçapp¡ªthe Domestic Agencies¡ªand key suppliers.    Registration for one-to-one meetings, either "business to business" or "business to customers," will open in a few days.   IBF/15 is a unique occasion for companies to approach the ºÚÁÏÉçapp Project and to investigate possibilities for involvement or partnership around upcoming tender offers.

Visit the IBF/15  for more information.

?The 42nd International Zvenigorod Conference for plasma physics and thermonuclear fusion was held on 9-13 February, near Moscow, Russia.

At this annual event, experts from inside Russia and from abroad gather to discuss recent achievements in the areas of high and low temperature plasma research, controlled fusion, and developments in plasma and beam technologies.

Part of the conference is traditionally devoted to progress in ºÚÁÏÉçapp. In the presence of Anatoly Krasilnikov, head of the Russian Domestic Agency, representatives from ºÚÁÏÉçapp Russia and from the research centres and industries involved in the project gave more than 50 oral presentations and reports on the first day of the conference on the progress in ºÚÁÏÉçapp procurement and manufacturing. Topics included the magnet system, in-vessel plasma-facing components, and diagnostic instruments.

The presentations generated wide interest among the members of the expert community, including representatives of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the State Corporation Rosatom and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

-- Alexander Petrov, ºÚÁÏÉçapp Russia