Of Interest archive

The ITER Organization plans a regular, one-week ITER International School for young scientists and engineers around a specific theme. The School locations alternate between France and one of the seven ITER Members. 

Before the global pandemic made travel and gathering impossible, a 2020 ITER International School, co-organized with Aix-Marseille University (France), was planned on the topic of "The Impact and Consequences of Energetic Particles in Fusion Plasmas." First pushed back to 2021, the decision has now been made to hold this School in summer 2023. More details will be provided on the re-scheduled IIS 2020 in autumn 2022 on this ITER webpage.

In the interim, a summer 2022 ITER International School will be hosted by the US Burning Plasma Organization. Further details will be published about IIS 2022 on the ITER website in autumn 2021.

The 29th biennial IAEA Fusion Energy Conference will be held in London in October 2023, hosted by the UK Atomic Energy Authority's Culham Centre for Fusion Energy. Further details on the event will be shared as information becomes available.

Watch the original announcement by UKAEA here. 

A virtual symposium on fusion research will take place on Friday, 18 June, from 1:30-6:00 p.m. CEST.

This event is organized by PhD students Richelle Boone (Leiden University) and Michiel Bron (Maastricht University), and aims to explore fusion from the perspectives of social sciences and the humanities. The symposium will feature seven sessions with experts presenting the historical, philosophical, sociological, economic and political aspects of fusion.

The symposium is free to attend, but registration is required.

See the event page here.

(P.S. The event was recorded and can be viewed back through this link.)

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) publishes a quarterly Bulletin dedicated to educating readers on nuclear technology and its peaceful uses. The latest volume of the Bulletin explores the possibilities of fusion.

The Bulletin contains thirteen articles that explain the mechanics of fusion and highlight a few of the fusion projects currently developing around the world, including the ITER project. An article written by Wolfgang Picot, entitled "ITER: The World's Largest Fusion Experiment," offers a snapshot of ITER's progress in making fusion a reality.

The IAEA Bulletin, both current and past, is free to browse online. Find the latest issue on fusion here.

The International Atomic Energy Agency, supported by the European Fusion Education Network FuseNet, is about to release a new textbook on fusion technology. The publication is a follow-up to the IAEA textbook on fusion physics, which is consultable here. 

All Bachelor, Masters and Doctoral students of fusion are invited to submit a cover design proposal, in a Book Cover Contest that ends on Wednesday 30 June 2021. 

See all information and instructions on the FuseNet website.

Organized every two years by CEA Cadarache (France) and the Institute of Nuclear Physics PAN (Poland), the PhDiaFusion Summer School of Plasma Diagnostics is designed for graduate students and their tutors in the spirit of a "master and apprentice" approach.

The next edition will be held from 20 to 24 September 2021 on the topic of "Neutron diagnostics development for ITER, DEMO and IFMIF-DONES." 

For all information visit this page.

The 28th IAEA Fusion Energy Conference (FEC 2020) kicks off in just one week on 10 May 2021. For anyone who would like to join as an observer, you must register through this link by 7 May 2021. (Please note: observers can watch all presentations, but will not have access to the Q&A feature of the virtual platform or be able to interact.)

The biennial Fusion Energy Conference is the premier gathering for the international fusion science community. It fosters the exchange of scientific and technical results in nuclear fusion research and development and provides a forum for the discussion of key physics and technology issues as well as innovative concepts of direct relevance to the use of nuclear fusion as a future source of energy.

The 28th IAEA Fusion Energy Conference will be held as a virtual web congress from 10 to 15 May 2021. Organized by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), it is supported by the Government of France through the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission (CEA) and the ITER Organization.

To learn more about the six-day event, please visit the conference website: https://fec2020.fr/ 

The 58h Culham Plasma Physics Summer School, planned in person from 6 to 17 September 2021, is open for applications.

The aim of the Summer School is to provide an introduction to the fundamental principles of plasma physics, together with a broad understanding of its fields of application. The organizers of the School assume no previous knowledge of the subject, but familiarity with electromagnetism and applied mathematics at first degree level would be helpful. Lecturers are drawn from the Culham Centre for Fusion Energy (CCFE), the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory (RAL), and leading European universities. All are renowned experts in their fields.

The deadline for applications is 30 July.

For more details please visit: https://culhamsummerschool.org.uk/

The EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in the Science and Technology of Fusion Energy is accepting applications for Autumn 2021 entry (plasma strand).

Potential projects are listed on this Fusion CDT webpage. 

The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) is the main UK government agency for funding research and training in engineering and the physical sciences. Students undertake a 4 year PhD, where the first year allows students to explore the research area and build strong expertise in their "home" discipline while developing the skills and knowledge to cross disciplinary boundaries effectively. Students also undertake a formal programme of taught coursework to develop and enhance technical knowledge across a range of appropriate disciplines, as well as enhancing skills.

Qualified overseas applicants are welcome to apply; however, the availability of fully funded positions is limited.

For all application information see this page on the Fusion CDT website.

Are you a female student or a young professional in the field of nuclear physics or nuclear engineering? Are you wondering in which area to specialize, or what the right next step in your career is? Then this IAEA webinar featuring careers for women in fusion science and technology might be the right one for you!

Five renowned female fusion experts will highlight their own career paths and what motivated them to start working and stay in this field. They will discuss the role of women in fusion science and technology, what is needed to increase the representation of female experts in this field and why fusion offers a promising career for women. 

Date: 15:00 CET on 14 April 2021
Register for the event here: https://bit.ly/2Phnggv
Password for the event: fusion1!

The 28th IAEA Fusion Energy Conference (FEC 2020) will take place on line from 10 to 15 May 2021. Deadlines are fast approaching for the submittal of documents:

Deadline for submitting manuscripts and other materials (presentations, summary slides, posters, journal articles): 9 April 2021

Deadline for submitting recorded presentations: 15 April 2021 

See the IAEA FEC 2020 website for guidelines and uploading instructions. To register as an observer complete Form A here (right margin). Potential sponsors and journalists should consult the local organizer website here.

Scientists at the DIII-D National Fusion Facility in San Diego, California, have released a new design for a compact fusion reactor that can generate electricity and help define the technology necessary for commercial fusion power. The approach is based on the "Advanced Tokamak" concept pioneered by the DIII-D program, which enables a higher-performance, self-sustaining configuration that holds energy more efficiently than in typical pulsed configurations, allowing it to be built at a reduced scale and cost.

"The key to our approach is to raise the pressure inside the tokamak," said project lead Dr. Richard Buttery. "This makes more fusion occur, allowing us to reduce the current, which in turn makes the plasma easier to sustain and more stable. Our simulations show that by carefully shaping the plasma and moving the current toward its edge, we can suppress turbulent heat losses and support higher pressures at lower currents, to reach a state where the plasma sustains itself. This enables a device that can simply be turned on, generating electricity continuously in a steady state."

Read the General Atomics press release here.

A new video issued by Fusion for Energy, the European Domestic Agency, takes us onto the shop floor at Walter Tosto where three ITER vacuum vessel sectors are in various stages of fabrication.

Each 440-tonne sector is formed from four segments, and each segment requires the same step-by-step fabrication route: contractors form and weld the inner shell, attach inner ribs and support housings, install in-wall shielding blocks, and—in the final activity to complete the segments—fit and weld the outer shell.

Europe—responsible for delivering five sectors to ITER—is working with the AMW Consortium (Ansaldo Nucleare, Mangiarotti, Walter Tosto) and an extensive network of European subcontractors. At Walter Tosto, in Chieti, Italy, teams are currently finalizing dimension checks on the sub-parts of sector #5, and completing welding on the segments of sectors #4 and #9.

Watch the two-minute video here.

Cooperative research between the DIII-D National Fusion Facility in USA and the Institute of Plasma Physics (ASIPP) of the Hefei Institutes of Physical Science (HFIPS) in China has identified a key approach to creating plasma conditions that will be necessary for steady-state operation of ITER. This new approach shows promise in avoiding potential edge instabilities in the plasma that can pose increased plasma-material interaction challenges.

Plasma instabilities known as edge-localized modes (ELMs) are a challenge to stable operation of fusion reactors. Effective ELM control is particularly important in high-confinement, steady-state fusion plasmas such as ITER. The research at DIII-D and EAST found that maintaining high density at the edge of the plasma and a high density ratio between the pedestal bottom and top can reduce the severity of ELMs.

"Combining ELM control with high fusion performance will be critical for efficient operation of ITER and the power plants that come after it," said XU Guosheng. "These results are an important step toward practical fusion energy."

One approach to ELM control has been creating plasma conditions in which ELMs may occur, but are much smaller. Known as "grassy" ELMs, these conditions have been achieved on other devices, but often under parameters that are not suitable for large, long pulse devices like ITER. Experiments on DIII-D demonstrated a grassy ELM regime at an ITER-relevant parameters.

Read the full press release here.

In lieu of an in-person ITER Business Forum this year, the ITER Organization is planning a two-day Remote ITER Business Meeting, from 6 to 7 April 2021.

The purpose is the same: to inform the business community about upcoming contract opportunities at ITER and to create the opportunity for businesses to meet and plan together through B2B meetings.

It will also be possible to meet project specialists in one-to-one Skype sessions on a variety of topics, including how to set up a business in the south of France with the Welcome Around ITER network and specific contract opportunities (Hot Cell, maintenance services, Tritium Plant, remote maintenance, and European contract opportunities through Fusion for Energy).  

To participate, fill out your pre-registration form on this website: https://www.iter.org/ribm2021. The deadline is 6 April 2021.

The EUROfusion consortium has announced the award of 16 fusion energy research grants across Europe for the development of innovative new ideas and techniques.

EUROfusion makes grants available on behalf of the European Commission's Euratom program. In its meeting on 3 March 2021, the General Assembly of EUROfusion selected 16 out of 72 Enabling Research proposals based on the recommendations of the scientific boards in four research categories. EUROfusion will invest a total of € 20.1 million in these projects, of which € 9.9 million comes as a contribution from the consortium.

The four research categories are: materials, theory and modelling, technology and systems, and inertial fusion. 

View the list of the recipients and their projects on the EUROfusion website.

The 18 toroidal field magnets of the JT-60SA tokamak in Japan are now fully energized at a current of 25.7kA. Reaching the full design magnetic field for this coil set is another step of the commissioning activities underway on this collaborative project, financed and executed jointly by Europe and Japan. 

Each of the 18 coils is 7.5 metres high and 4.5 metres wide; together they weigh 370 tonnes. They produce a magnetic field running around the torus that has a strength of 2.25T at the centre of its cross section. This field is fundamental to confining the superheated plasma of the tokamak.

The successful generation of the toroidal field demonstrates the simultaneous operation of numerous tokamak systems, in particular the cryoplant, cryodistribution, the cryostat, the thermal shields, power supply, instrumentation, and central control. The commissioning phase will culminate with first plasma later this year. 

More information here.

An article published on 22 February 2021 in Nature highlights the importance of the upcoming campaign on the JET tokamak (UK) for ITER.

"Nuclear fusion experiments with deuterium and tritium at the Joint European Torus are a crucial dress rehearsal for the mega-experiment," writes author Elizabeth Gibney. "JET's experiments will help scientists to predict how the plasma in the ITER tokamak will behave and to craft the mega-experiment's operating settings."

Chief ITER scientist Tim Luce agrees. "It's the closest we can get to achieving ITER conditions in present-day machines."

JET will be running experiments with hydrogen isotopes tritium and deuterium—the very fuel mix that ITER will use. Some experiments will use just tritium; others will combine deuterium and tritium in equal proportions. Both types of experiment are important, the author explains, because a key goal is to understand the effect of tritium's larger mass on plasma behaviour (tritium has two neutrons in its nucleus, whereas deuterium has one and hydrogen has none). That will help in predicting the impact of using different isotopes in ITER.

Read the full article here.

"A [US] fusion plant is still years away, but it is definitely getting closer."

So concludes the Editor-in-Chief of Nuclear News, the American Nuclear Society's flagship publication, in the preface to the January 2021 issue. Nuclear News dedicates more than 50 pages to fusion energy, at a time when there is an increasing groundswell of interest in fusion in the United States and coalescence around the idea of constructing a fusion pilot plant. 

Highlights include a major contribution by ITER Director-General Bernard Bigot on the role of ITER; an article on public/private partnerships as the ideal way of advancing technology; features on fusion safety and the regulatory environment; input from startups looking to commercialize fusion energy; and an editorial by US ITER Project Office Director Kathy McCarthy, Associate Laboratory Director for Fusion and Fission Energy and Science at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

See a preview of the issue, or subscribe on the American Nuclear Society's website.

The National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine has released a report calling for the construction in the US of a 50-megawatt pilot fusion power plant.

At the request of the US Department of Energy (DOE), a committee of 12 scientists has written Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Grid, with the aim of providing guidance on the key goals and innovation needed to build an electricity-producing fusion power plant at lowest possible capital cost.

This is the third major US report on fusion in 24 months.

• - In 2019, the National Academies published the Final Report of the Committee on a Strategic Plan for U.S. Burning Plasma Research, recommending 1) that the US remain a partner in ITER "as the most cost-effective way to gain experience with a burning plasma at the scale of a power plant," and 2) that the US start a "national program of accompanying research and technology leading to the construction of a compact pilot plant." (Read more here.)
• - In March 2020, hundreds of scientists representing a broad range of national labs, universities, and private ventures released A Community Plan for Fusion Energy and Discovery Plasma Sciences. It offers a consensus view of the bold steps to take nationally to deliver fusion energy and advance plasma science in the United States, including maintaining participation in ITER. (See more here.)

The new publication builds on both reports.

"Fusion energy offers the prospect of addressing the nation's energy needs and contributing to the transition to a low-carbon emission electrical generation infrastructure. Technology and research results from U.S. investments in the major fusion burning plasma experiment known as ITER, coupled with a strong foundation of research funded by the Department of Energy, position the United States to begin planning for its first fusion pilot plant. Strong interest from the private sector is an additional motivating factor, as the process of decarbonizing and modernizing the nation's electric infrastructure accelerates and companies seek to lead the way."

Read the full report here.

Or view the slides from a recent webinar on the report.