Scientists from the ITER Organization and the Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics have performed the first realistic three-dimensional simulations of ITER plasma disruptions with cloud computing support in collaboration with Google. These large-scale simulations help scientists to understand the physical processes occurring during disruptions and confirm the capability of the disruption mitigation system to reduce the electromagnetic forces to the levels required on the ITER Tokamak. For decades, physicists have been trying to understand and predict plasma behaviour in future reactor-scale tokamaks such as ITER and DEMO. Unfortunately, these hot, strongly magnetized plasmas are extremely complex and it was very quickly evident that the there was never going to be any other alternative than numerical simulations to describe the dynamics of plasma transport. Such simulations have thus always been an essential part of fusion research. As supercomputers become more and more powerful and the fidelity of plasma simulations improves, scientists are able to make better predictions. Nevertheless, there remain particularly challenging tokamak plasma phenomena such as disruptions, in which the thermal and magnetic energy stored in the plasma is lost on very rapid timescales. Modelling these events and thus understanding better how to avoid them or mitigate their impact on tokamak operation, pushes the limits of today's simulation capabilities. In present tokamak experiments, a disruption may occur when operating near plasma stability limits or when systems malfunction. ITER will be equipped with an extremely sophisticated disruption mitigation system to minimize the effects of these transient events on the tokamak components. Although disruption events are rather short (typically less than 150 milliseconds in ITER), magneto-hydro-dynamic simulation codes need months of computations and millions of computer hours to simulate a few tens of milliseconds. For such tasks, supercomputers are really the only approach with which results can be obtained in a reasonable time. In a recent study, scientists from the ITER Organization and the Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics in Germany have simulated ITER mitigated disruptions thanks to a collaboration with Google to demonstrate a cloud computing proof of concept. Extensive Google Cloud services, together with those of the ITER Scientific Data and Computing Centre and the EUROfusion Marconi supercomputer, have been leveraged to push towards more realistic plasma descriptions. While there are still several modelling aspects to be further refined, these simulations confirm that the ITER disruption mitigation system will be able to reduce the global magnetic forces acting on the ITER vacuum vessel, blanket/first wall and divertor. Such forces arise during the loss of the plasma magnetic energy known as the "current quench" phase of the disruption, in which the plasma current decays very rapidly. During this collapse phase, electric currents induced in the vacuum vessel and in-vessel components (blanket/first wall and divertor) drive the production of magnetic forces. A description of these new results, just published in the journal Nuclear Fusion, clearly demonstrates the benefits of a fast current quench (compared to the decay time of the vessel currents) in reducing the vacuum vessel forces. The ITER disruption mitigation system will control the speed of the current quench by cooling down the plasma with cryogenic pellets. Newsline has regularly reported how this technique is being demonstrated routinely in many research tokamaks (for example in ASDEX Upgrade, DIII-D, KSTAR and JET) coordinated by the ITER Disruption Mitigation Task Force in support of the physics basis and technology design of the ITER disruption mitigation system.

China's Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST) has made an important advance by achieving stable 1056-second steady-state high-temperature plasma operation, setting a record for long-pulse operation on the night of 30 December 2021. With this result EAST, located at the Institute of Plasma Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (ASIPP), has become the first tokamak that can operate with a pulse length in thousand-second scale, with plasma temperatures in the tens of million degrees Celsius and self-driven current, as foreseen for the ITER Q ≥ 5 long-pulse and steady-state scenarios. A great challenge for fusion energy research is to maintain the confinement of a burning plasma for a sufficiently long duration and with a high duty-cycle. The magnets of superconducting tokamak devices are capable of supporting long-pulse operation; however, to maintain a plasma at high temperature over these timescales, integrated solutions to key technical and physics issues are needed. This concerns, for example, maintaining the temperature of the components in contact with the plasma under control; controlling the plasma magnetic configuration for long durations; or driving current in the plasma with heating and current drive systems to extend the discharge to longer durations that can be maintained by the central solenoid. Figure 1. EAST's 1056-second steady-state high-temperature plasma discharge. From top to bottom: Plasma normalized pressure (poloidal beta); voltage applied by the central solenoid; electron temperature and injected energy into the plasma; plasma density; and peripheral deuterium light emission and heat flux to the divertor target. The EAST experiments have demonstrated that such technical and scientific challenges can be resolved. This was achieved in plasmas with dominant electron heating and low input torque driving the plasma current with an actively cooled ITER-like tungsten divertor with the capability to handle a heat flux of up to 10 MWm-2. EAST achieved a fully non-inductive current-driven steady-state plasma with a normalized confinement factor H89 of ~1.3 (i.e., 30% higher than L-mode confinement) and total injected energy into the plasma of 1.73 GJ (see Figure 1). In these plasmas, 70% of the current is driven by the heating and current drive systems while 30% is driven by the plasma itself due to transport processes (bootstrap current) because of the high normalized pressure of the plasma (poloidal beta ~ 1.5). For comparison, in the ITER 10 MA Q ≥ 5 steady-state plasma scenario the poloidal beta is ~ 1.0 and 66% of the current is driven by heating and current drive systems and 33% by the plasma itself (i.e., a very similar proportion to the EAST results, see Figure 2). Figure 2. Normalized current profiles showing the externally driven currents and the plasma self-driven current for the ITER 10 MA/5.3 T Q ≥ 5 steady-state plasma and for the EAST record-duration plasma shot #106915 of December 2021. To sustain this plasma it was necessary to control plasma equilibrium and position over long time scales, which is challenging for the magnetic diagnostics since low drifts of the electronics must be maintained. Similarly, large divertor heat fluxes must be handled over long time scales at a level of ~ 3 MWm-2, impurities (particularly tungsten from the divertor) must be prevented from contaminating and cooling down the plasma, and good pumping of the edge plasma neutrals must be maintained to ensure that the plasma density does not rise in an uncontrolled way, terminating the plasma discharge. All these scientific and technical aspects have been demonstrated on EAST, which was specifically built for demonstrating long-pulse high-performance operation with an ITER-like configuration and heating schemes. Thus, the success of EAST's experiment in maintaining a high temperature plasma beyond 1000 seconds is an important milestone on the way to exploring and controlling plasmas that will be required for ITER and future fusion reactors.

Fusion is about harnessing Nature's most powerful energy source: the fabulous forces that are liberated when two light atoms merge into a heavier one. The challenge, which ITER is designed to overcome, is immense and the difficulties innumerable. There are however other natural forces, more familiar but no less impressive, that ITER sometimes needs to deal with. Two months ago in late January, as the third vacuum vessel sector manufactured in Korea was ready to ship, gale force winds and swelling seas on the southeastern coast of the country where the Hyundai Heavy Industry shipyard is located prevented the loading of the massive component onto the waiting ship. As time was running short and the storm showed no sign of abating, a solution had to be found fast. Thanks to an exemplary collaboration between all the actors involved, both at Ulsan harbour and at the receiving end in southern France, the 440-tonne vacuum vessel sector was loaded onto a barge and moved twenty kilometres to a protected pier, where normal ship loading operations could resume. "The situation was really difficult," explains Kijung Jung, the Head of the Korean Domestic Agency. "As the barge transfer had not been anticipated, we first needed a green light from ITER Director-General Bernard Bigot to proceed. In the early morning of 24 January, we had a telephone conversion and the authorization to proceed was given as an emergency measure." Preparing the barge operation, both technically and administratively, mobilized the teams for almost three full days and at 10:30 a.m. on 26 January, the high-sea vessel with vacuum vessel sector #8 safely fastened in its hold began its month-long, 12,000-kilometre journey to Marseille harbour and later to the ITER site, where it arrived safely in the early hours of Friday 1 April. As sector # 8 sat on stillage, towering above the small group gathered in the ITER Cleaning Facility to celebrate the component's delivery, pride and emotion could still be felt in Kijung Jung's voice as he narrated the details of the "fantastic emergency action" that enabled the timely delivery and thanked all those who had made it possible—especially the Korean freight forwarder Shinjo and ITER global logistics provider DAHER. Standing as tall as a six-storey building, an ITER vacuum vessel sector is a first-of-a-kind component that combines exceptional size and extreme dimensional precision. "The manufacturing itself was much more difficult than we expected," admitted Jung. An ITER component does not exist on its own. Beyond the expertise of its manufacturer, it is also the product of a large collaboration. "In this long process, which began in 2008 with the signature of the Procurement Arrangement, the Korean Domestic Agency has worked closely with the vacuum vessel project team here at ITER; with the European Domestic Agency that will deliver five similar sectors; with India, that provides the in-wall shielding; and with Russia, that manufactures the upper ports," said Youngeek Jung, head of the ITER Construction Domain. The ITER Vacuum Vessel Section, headed by Alex Martin (first row, centre, with ITER Vacuum Vessel Team Leader Hyun-soo Kim) is the second recipient of the "Commit to deliver" (C2D) award, symbolized by a tree to be planted in the ITER butterfly garden. There are now three vacuum vessel sectors on site. Sector #6, delivered in August 2020, has already been equipped and assembled with two toroidal field coils and corresponding thermal shield segments and is almost ready to be installed in the Tokamak assembly pit. A second Korean sector, #1(7), reached ITER in August 2021 has entered the first phases of the sub-assembly process. Sector #8 will follow the same path in a few months. Korea is scheduled to deliver the fourth and last sector in November of this year. "We will make our best effort to ensure that the remaining items that we are manufacturing, including vacuum vessel sector ##7(1), can be delivered timely and successfully," said Kyungho Park, vice-president of Hyundai Heavy Industry who joined the event through remote connection. Although vacuum vessel sectors are now a familiar sight in the ITER Assembly Hall, their alien shape and daring mission still exert a sort of fascination: they form the chamber that will face, at a few metres distance, the heart of a star ten times hotter than the Sun.

The smallest of ITER's six ring-shaped poloidal field coils has passed all factory acceptance tests in Russia. The next step is shipment to the ITER site. At the Sredne-Nevsky Shipyard in Saint Petersburg, specialists have completed the factory acceptance tests on poloidal field coil #1 (PF1). Successful testing, confirmed by specialists of the ITER Organization, allows Russian enterprises to begin preparing for the shipment of the magnet coil to ITER in the south of France. Nine metres in diameter and weighing 160 tonnes, PF1 is one of six coils in the ITER poloidal field magnetic system, which serves to confine fusion fuel in the form of a plasma in the ITER reactor. At the core of each poloidal field magnet are coiled layers of niobium-titanium (NbTi) superconductor—for PF1, approximately 6 km of conductor was required. The fabrication of an ITER poloidal field coil requires several stages of verification due to their first-of-a-kind nature and the extremely high requirements imposed by the ITER Organization. High-voltage DC tests with a voltage of 30 kV, high-voltage AC tests with a voltage of 10 kV, a Paschen test with a voltage of 15 kV in a vacuum chamber with a pressure range of 1-100 000 Pa, and leak tests in a vacuum vessel are all part of the factory acceptance testing package. The results of all tests performed earlier this year confirmed full compliance with the requirements of the ITER Organization. This is one of the 25 systems included in the scope of responsibility of the Russian Federation in the framework of the ITER Project. The shipment of the PF1 coil to ITER is planned for the middle of this year.

It is a bit after 1:00 p.m. in the vast ITER Cleaning Facility and second-shift workers from the CNPE consortium are assembled for their daily briefing. As they stand to attention, a foreman in a green helmet, bullhorn in hand, communicates the objectives of the day, describes the co-activity they will encounter, and emphasizes the importance of strictly observing safety rules. The CNPE consortium comprises several Chinese companies (China Nuclear Power Engineering; China Nuclear Industry 23 Construction Company Ltd.; Southwestern Institute of Physics; Institute of Plasma Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences ASIPP) and the French company Framatome. It was awarded the Tokamak Assembly Contract 1 (TAC1) in September 2019. TAC1 focuses on the assembly of the cryostat and cryostat thermal shield, the magnet feeders, the central solenoid, poloidal field and correction coil magnets, and cooling structures and instrumentation. Approximately 45 TAC1 workers are presently involved in the installation of magnet feeders and the preparation of the central solenoid assembly. See more about ITER machine assembly here.

On Monday 28 March 2022, the Chinese Embassy in France organized a ceremony in honour of the two French laureates of the 2020 China International Science and Technology Cooperation Award. Eight international scientists had been named during the National Science and Technology Award Conference held in Beijing in November 2021; due to the pandemic, the prize ceremonies are being organized by Chinese embassies. Fusion expert Alain Bécoulet and French hematologist Jacques Caen received their awards from the hands of Ambassador Lu Shaye. Alain Bécoulet is former director of the Institute for Magnetic Fusion Research (IRFM), part of the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission (CEA), and current Head of the ITER Engineering Domain. In the course of his career, he helped to develop scientific collaboration between the Chinese and European fusion communities, particulary between the WEST project that he headed at IRFM and China's EAST tokamak. He has been a frequent visitor to the country, making more than 30 trips and developing "warm and confident relationships." HE expressed his "honour, pride and joy" at receiving the prize during his acceptance speech in Paris.  The International Science and Technology Cooperation Award was initiated by China's State Council in 1994, and is conferred on foreign individuals or organizations that have made important contribution to China's science and technology development.

During the 30th Symposium on Fusion Engineering (SOFE 2023, 9-14 July 2023), the Fusion Technology Awards for 2022 and 2023 will be presented to individuals who have distinguished themselves through innovation in all fusion approaches that have shown significant promise or progress in the design of reactors or in the understanding of fusion plasmas. The awards each consist of a USD 3,000 cash prize and a plaque. The nomination package should be sent to the Fusion Technology Committee Awards Chair, Dr. Carl Pawley (drcpawley@ieee.org), and it should consist of a letter describing the technical contributions on which the nomination is recommended and a current resume of the candidate. Other supporting endorsements are encouraged. The nomination deadline for the 2022 and 2023 Fusion Technology Awards is 8 April 2022. For more detailed information on eligibility, basis for judging, the nomination process or a list of past award recipients, please visit the IEEE-NPSS website and go to the "Fusion Technology Awards" section.