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DOE OSTI2023

Observation of the effect of gravity on the motion of antimatter

Einstein’s general theory of relativity from 1915 remains the most successful description of gravitation. From the 1919 solar eclipse to the observation of gravitational waves, the theory has passed many crucial experimental tests. However, the evolving concepts of dark matter and dark energy illustrate that there is much to be learned about the gravitating content of the universe. Singularities in the general theory of relativity and the lack of a quantum theory of gravity suggest that our picture is incomplete. It is thus prudent to explore gravity in exotic physical systems. Antimatter was unknown to Einstein in 1915. Dirac’s theory appeared in 1928; the positron was observed in 1932. There has since been much speculation about gravity and antimatter. The theoretical consensus is that any laboratory mass must be attracted by the Earth, although some authors have considered the cosmological consequences if antimatter should be repelled by matter. In the general theory of relativity, the weak equivalence principle (WEP) requires that all masses react identically to gravity, independent of their internal structure. Here we show that antihydrogen atoms, released from magnetic confinement in the ALPHA-g apparatus, behave in a way consistent with gravitational attraction to the Earth. Repulsive ‘antigravity’ is ruled out in this case. This experiment paves the way for precision studies of the magnitude of the gravitational acceleration between anti-atoms and the Earth to test the WEP.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

DOE OSTI2023

Hydrogen isotope analysis in W-tiles using fs-LIBS

Abstract Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) is a promising technology for in-situ analysis of Plasma-Facing Components in magnetic confinement fusion facilities. It is of major interest to monitor the hydrogen isotope retention i.e. tritium and deuterium over many operation hours to guarantee safety and availability of the future reactor. In our studies we use ultraviolet femtosecond laser pulses to analyze tungsten (W) tiles that were exposed to a deuterium plasma in the linear plasma device PSI-2, which mimics conditions at the first wall. A high-resolution spectrometer is used to detect the Balmer- $$\alpha$$ α transition of the surface from implanted hydrogen isotopes (H and D). We use Calibration Free CF-LIBS to quantify the amount of deuterium stored in W. This proof-of-principle study shows the applicability of femtosecond lasers for the detection of low deuterium concentration as present in first wall material of prevailing fusion experiments.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

DOE OSTI2022

First-principles theory of the rate of magnetic reconnection in magnetospheric and solar plasmas

Abstract The rate of magnetic reconnection is of the utmost importance in a variety of processes because it controls, for example, the rate energy is released in solar flares, the speed of the Dungey convection cycle in Earth’s magnetosphere, and the energy release rate in harmful geomagnetic substorms. It is known from numerical simulations and satellite observations that the rate is approximately 0.1 in normalized units, but despite years of effort, a full theoretical prediction has not been obtained. Here, we present a first-principles theory for the reconnection rate in non-relativistic electron-ion collisionless plasmas, and show that the same prediction explains why Sweet-Parker reconnection is considerably slower. The key consideration of this analysis is the pressure at the reconnection site (i.e., the x-line). We show that the Hall electromagnetic fields in antiparallel reconnection cause an energy void, equivalently a pressure depletion, at the x-line, so the reconnection exhaust opens out, enabling the fast rate of 0.1. If the energy can reach the x-line to replenish the pressure, the exhaust does not open out. In addition to heliospheric applications, these results are expected to impact reconnection studies in planetary magnetospheres, magnetically confined fusion devices, and astrophysical plasmas.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

DOE OSTI2022

A general framework for quantifying uncertainty at scale

Abstract In many fields of science, comprehensive and realistic computational models are available nowadays. Often, the respective numerical calculations call for the use of powerful supercomputers, and therefore only a limited number of cases can be investigated explicitly. This prevents straightforward approaches to important tasks like uncertainty quantification and sensitivity analysis. This challenge can be overcome via our recently developed sensitivity-driven dimension-adaptive sparse grid interpolation strategy. The method exploits, via adaptivity, the structure of the underlying model (such as lower intrinsic dimensionality and anisotropic coupling of the uncertain inputs) to enable efficient and accurate uncertainty quantification and sensitivity analysis at scale. Here, we demonstrate the efficiency of this adaptive approach in the context of fusion research, in a realistic, computationally expensive scenario of turbulent transport in a magnetic confinement tokamak device with eight uncertain parameters, reducing the effort by at least two orders of magnitude. In addition, we show that this refinement method intrinsically provides an accurate surrogate model that is nine orders of magnitude cheaper than the high-fidelity model.

Farcaş, Ionuţ-Gabriel (ORCID:0000000238841580)↗

DOE OSTI2017

Electromagnetic simulations of JET ICRF ITER-like antenna with TOPICA and SSWICH asymptotic codes

Multi-megawatt Ion Cyclotron Range of Frequencies (ICRF) heating is routinely used in the JET tokamak. To increase the ICRF heating power available from the A2 antennas, the ICRF ITER-Like Antenna (ILA) was reinstalled for the 2015 JET ITER-like wall experimental campaign. The application of high levels of ICRF power typically results in increased plasma wall interaction which leads to the observation of enhanced influx of metallic impurities in the plasma edge. It is assumed that the impurity production is mainly driven by the parallel component of the Radio-Frequency (RF) antenna electric near-field, E// (parallel to the confinement magnetic field of the tokamak), that is rectified in a thin boundary layer (RF sheath). Torino Polytechnic Ion Cyclotron Antenna (TOPICA) code was used to compute E // field maps in front of the ILA and between its poloidal limiters in the presence of plasma using measured density profiles and various antenna feedings. E // field maps calculated between the poloidal limiters were used to estimate the poloidal distribution of RF-sheath Direct Current (DC) potential in this private region of the ILA and make relative comparison of various antenna electrical settings. For this purpose we used the asymptotic version of the Self-consistent Sheaths and Waves for Ion Cyclotron Heating Slow-Wave (SSWICH-SW) code. These estimations can help to study the formation of RF sheaths around the antenna and even at distant locations (~3m away).

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

DOE OSTI2026

An implicit-explicit time splitting strategy for the far SOL plasma fluid model with DG-FEM discretization

We consider a far scrape-off layer (SOL) plasma fluid model of ions that is governed by a Braginskiitype model: a one-dimensional, nonlinear system of advection-diffusion equations coupled with a diffusion equation for neutral particles. Our motivation for studying this system arises from the coupling between the edge plasma and radio-frequency (RF) heating, where solving a far SOL plasma fluid model provides critical insights into edge plasma dynamics. Numerical simulations of plasma fluid models require advanced computational techniques to achieve both efficiency and accuracy, especially when resolving the boundary layer in magnetically confined plasmas. In this work, we propose an implicit-explicit time operator splitting strategy that allows for an efficient solution algorithm, where the diffusive terms are treated semi-implicitly requiring only a linear solve, while the advection part is handled explicitly using a strong-stability-preserving Runge-Kutta (SSP-RK3) scheme. This leads to a fully decoupled system in which the diffusion and advection sub-problems can be solved separately, simplifying the overall solution procedure and allowing for efficient parallelization, which is particularly relevant for exploring the impact of RF heating on the SOL plasma. The main challenge of the discretization is due to the strong coupling between diffusion and advection, particularly through the boundary conditions. This makes implementation of such a scheme in an accurate and stable manner nontrivial. We discuss in detail how to split the equations and manage boundary conditions to maintain stability and well-posedness for each subsystem. We also describe a spatial discretization approach, based on the discontinuous Galerkin finite element method (DG-FEM) and present numerical results for a one-dimensional system.

Burkovska, Olena [ORNL] (ORCID:0000000163101130)↗

DOE OSTI2026

MAPS: the MFEM Anisotropic Plasma Solver

Simulating magnetically confined fusion plasmas presents a uniquely challenging problem due to the nonlinear anisotropic heat conduction. We introduce the MAPS (MFEM Anisotropic Plasma Solver) tool, which uses a high-order finite element method to compute transport solutions on unstructured meshes. We show results for a set of three 2-D verification tests, two of which demonstrate the expected convergence properties for various mesh resolutions and polynomial degrees. We then discuss the convergence rate for the third test.

Barnett, Rhea [ORNL] (ORCID:0000000317527979)↗

DOE OSTI2016

Design and characterization of a prototype divertor viewing infrared video bolometer for NSTX-U

The InfraRed Video Bolometer (IRVB) is a powerful tool to measure radiated power in magnetically confined plasmas due to its ability to obtain 2D images of plasma emission using a technique that is compatible with the fusion nuclear environment. A prototype IRVB has been developed and installed on NSTX-U to view the lower divertor. The IRVB is a pinhole camera which images radiation from the plasma onto a 2.5 μm thick, 9 × 7 cm{sup 2} Pt foil and monitors the resulting spatio-temporal temperature evolution using an IR camera. The power flux incident on the foil is calculated by solving the 2D+time heat diffusion equation, using the foil’s calibrated thermal properties. An optimized, high frame rate IRVB, is quantitatively compared to results from a resistive bolometer on the bench using a modulated 405 nm laser beam with variable power density and square wave modulation from 0.2 Hz to 250 Hz. The design of the NSTX-U system and benchtop characterization are presented where signal-to-noise ratios are assessed using three different IR cameras: FLIR A655sc, FLIR A6751sc, and SBF-161. The sensitivity of the IRVB equipped with the SBF-161 camera is found to be high enough to measure radiation features in the NSTX-U lower divertor as estimated using SOLPS modeling. The optimized IRVB has a frame rate up to 50 Hz, high enough to distinguish radiation during edge-localized-modes (ELMs) from that between ELMs.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗

DOE OSTI2016

Development of plasma bolometers using fiber-optic temperature sensors

Measurements of radiated power in magnetically confined plasmas are important for exhaust studies in present experiments and expected to be a critical diagnostic for future fusion reactors. Resistive bolometer sensors have long been utilized in tokamaks and helical devices but suffer from electromagnetic interference (EMI). Results are shown from initial testing of a new bolometer concept based on fiber-optic temperature sensor technology. A small, 80 μm diameter, 200 μm long silicon pillar attached to the end of a single mode fiber-optic cable acts as a Fabry–Pérot cavity when broadband light, λ{sub o} ∼ 1550 nm, is transmitted along the fiber. Changes in temperature alter the optical path length of the cavity primarily through the thermo-optic effect, resulting in a shift of fringes reflected from the pillar detected using an I-MON 512 OEM spectrometer. While initially designed for use in liquids, this sensor has ideal properties for use as a plasma bolometer: a time constant, in air, of ∼150 ms, strong absorption in the spectral range of plasma emission, immunity to local EMI, and the ability to measure changes in temperature remotely. Its compact design offers unique opportunities for integration into the vacuum environment in places unsuitable for a resistive bolometer. Using a variable focus 5 mW, 405 nm, modulating laser, the signal to noise ratio versus power density of various bolometer technologies are directly compared, estimating the noise equivalent power density (NEPD). Present tests show the fiber-optic bolometer to have NEPD of 5-10 W/m{sup 2} when compared to those of the resistive bolometer which can achieve <0.5 W/m{sup 2} in the laboratory, but this can degrade to 1-2 W/m{sup 2} or worse when installed on a tokamak. Concepts are discussed to improve the signal to noise ratio of this new fiber-optic bolometer by reducing the pillar height and adding thin metallic coatings, along with improving the spectral resolution of the interrogator.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗

DOE OSTI2016

Multi-energy x-ray detector calibration for T e and impurity density (n Z ) measurements of MCF plasmas

Here, soft x-ray detection with the new "multi-energy" PILATUS3 detector systems holds promise as a magnetically confined fusion (MCF) plasma diagnostic for ITER and beyond. The measured x-ray brightness can be used to determine impurity concentrations, electron temperatures, n 2 e Z eff products, and to probe the electron energy distribution. However, in order to be effective, these detectors which are really large arrays of detectors with photon energy gating capabilities must be precisely calibrated for each pixel. The energy-dependence of the detector response of the multi-energy PILATUS3 system with 100 K pixels has been measured at Dectris Laboratory. X-rays emitted from a tube under high voltage bombard various elements such that they emit x-ray lines from Zr-Lα to Ag-Kα between 1.8 and 22.16 keV. Each pixel on the PILATUS3 can be set to a minimum energy threshold in the range from 1.6 to 25 keV. This feature allows a single detector to be sensitive to a variety of x-ray energies, so that it is possible to sample the energy distribution of the x-ray continuum and line-emission. PILATUS3 can be configured for 1D or 2D imaging of MCF plasmas with typical spatial energy and temporal resolution of 1 cm, 0.6 keV, and 5 ms, respectively.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗

DOE OSTI2016

Measurement of the deuterium Balmer series line emission on EAST

Volume recombination plays an important role towards plasma detachment for magnetically confined fusion devices. High quantum number states of the Balmer series of deuterium are used to study recombination. On EAST (Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak), two visible spectroscopic measurements are applied for the upper/lower divertor with 13 channels, respectively. Both systems are coupled with Princeton Instruments ProEM EMCCD 1024B camera: one is equipped on an Acton SP2750 spectrometer, which has a high spectral resolution ∼0.0049 nm with 2400 gr/mm grating to measure the D{sub α}(H{sub α}) spectral line and with 1200 gr/mm grating to measure deuterium molecular Fulcher band emissions and another is equipped on IsoPlane SCT320 using 600 gr/mm to measure high-n Balmer series emission lines, allowing us to study volume recombination on EAST and to obtain the related line averaged plasma parameters (T{sub e}, n{sub e}) during EAST detached phases. This paper will present the details of the measurements and the characteristics of deuterium Balmer series line emissions during density ramp-up L-mode USN plasma on EAST.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗

DOE OSTI2017

Investigation of the interaction between competing types of nondiffusive transport in drift wave turbulence

Radial transport in turbulence dominated tokamak plasmas has been observed to deviate from classical diffusion in certain regimes relevant for magnetic confinement fusion. These situations at least include near-marginal turbulence, where radial transport becomes superdiffusive and mediated by elongated radial structures (or avalanches) and transport across radially sheared poloidal flows, where radial subdiffusion often ensues. In this paper, the interaction between very different physical ingredients responsible for these two types of nondiffusive dynamics (namely, turbulent profile relaxation close to a local threshold and the interaction with radially sheared zonal flows) is studied in detail in the context of a simple two-dimensional electrostatic plasma fluid turbulence model based on the dissipative trapped electron mode. It is shown that, depending on the relative relevance of each of these ingredients, which can be tuned in various ways, a variety of non-diffusive radial transport behaviors can be found in the system. The results also illustrate the fact that the classical diffusion paradigm is often insufficient to describe turbulent transport in systems with self-generated flows and turbulent profile relaxations.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

DOE OSTI2017

Transport dynamics of self-consistent, near-marginal drift-wave turbulence. I. Investigation of the ability of external flows to tune the non-diffusive dynamics

The reduction of turbulent transport across sheared flow regions has been known for a long time in magnetically confined toroidal plasmas. However, details of the dynamics are still unclear, in particular, in what refers to the changes caused by the flow on the nature of radial transport itself. In Paper II, we have shown in a simplified model of drift wave turbulence that, when the background profile is allowed to evolve self-consistently with fluctuations, a variety of transport regimes ranging from superdiffusive to subdiffusive open up depending on the properties of the underlying turbulence. In this study, we show that externally applied sheared flows can, under the proper conditions, cause the transport dynamics to be diffusive or subdiffusive

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

DOE OSTI2017

Determining the ion temperature and energy distribution in a lithium-plasma interaction test stand with a retarding field energy analyzer

The ThermoElectric-driven Liquid-metal plasma-facing Structures (TELS) experiment at the University of Illinois is a gas-puff driven, theta-pinch plasma source that is used as a test stand for off-normal plasma events incident on materials in the edge and divertor regions of a tokamak. The ion temperatures and resulting energy distributions are crucial for understanding how well a TELS pulse can simulate an extreme event in a larger, magnetic confinement device. A retarding field energy analyzer (RFEA) has been constructed for use with such a transient plasma due to its inexpensive and robust nature. The innovation surrounding the use of a control analyzer in conjunction with an actively sampling analyzer is presented and the conditions of RFEA operation are discussed, with results presented demonstrating successful performance under extreme conditions. Such extreme conditions are defined by heat fluxes on the order of 0.8 GW m -2 and on time scales of nearly 200 μs. Measurements from the RFEA indicate two primary features for a typical TELS discharge, following closely with the pre-ionizing coaxial gun discharge characteristics. For the case using the pre-ionization pulse (PiP) and the theta pinch, the measured ion signal showed an ion temperature of 23.3 ± 6.6 eV for the first peak and 17.6 ± 1.9 eV for the second peak. For the case using only the PiP, the measured signal showed an ion temperature of 7.9 ± 1.1 eV for the first peak and 6.6 ± 0.8 eV for the second peak. These differences illustrate the effectiveness of the theta pinch for imparting energy on the ions. This information also highlights the importance of TELS as being one of the few linear pulsed plasma sources whereby moderately energetic ions will strike targets without the need for sample biasing.

47 OTHER INSTRUMENTATION↗

DOE OSTI2018

Efficient design and verification of diagnostics for impurity transport experiments

Recent attempts to measure impurity transport in Alcator C-Mod using an x-ray imaging crystal spectrometer and laser blow-off impurity injector have failed to yield unique reconstructions of the transport coefficient profiles. This paper presents a fast, linearized model which was constructed to estimate diagnostic requirements for impurity transport experiments. The analysis shows that the spectroscopic diagnostics on Alcator C-Mod should be capable of inferring simple profiles of impurity diffusion DZ and convection VZ accurate to better than ±10% uncertainty, suggesting that the failure to infer unique DZ and VZ from experimental data is attributable to an inadequate analysis procedure rather than the result of insufficient diagnostics. Furthermore, the analysis reveals that even a modest spatial resolution can overcome a low time resolution. This approach can be adapted to design and verify diagnostics for transport experiments on any magnetic confinement device.

47 OTHER INSTRUMENTATION↗

DOE OSTI2018

Characterization of an electrothermal plasma source for fusion transient simulations

The realization of fusion energy requires materials that can withstand high heat and particle fluxes at the plasma material interface. Here in this work, an electrothermal (ET) plasma source has been designed as a transient heat flux source for a linear plasma material interaction device. An ET plasma source operates in the ablative arc regime driven by a DC capacitive discharge. The current channel width is defined by the 4 mm bore of a boron nitride liner. At large plasma currents, the arc impacts the liner wall, leading to high particle and heat fluxes to the liner material, which subsequently ablates and ionizes. This results in a high density plasma with a large unidirectional bulk flow out of the source exit. The pulse length for the ET source has been optimized using a pulse forming network to have durations of 1 and 2 ms. The peak currents and maximum source energies seen in this system are 1.9 kA and 1.2 kJ for the 2 ms pulse and 3.2 kA and 2.1 kJ for the 1 ms pulse, respectively. This work is a proof of the principal project to show that an ET source produces electron densities and heat fluxes comparable to those anticipated in transient events in large future magnetic confinement fusion devices. Heat flux, plasma temperature, and plasma density were determined for each shot using infrared imaging and optical spectroscopy techniques. This paper will discuss the assumptions, methods, and results of the experiments.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

DOE OSTI2017

Bistable dynamics of turbulence spreading in a corrugated temperature profile

We present a new model of turbulence spreading in magnetically confined plasma. A basic question in turbulence spreading is how to sustain finite amplitude fluctuations in a stable subcritical region, where linear dissipation of the turbulence is strong? The answer to this question relies on a consistent treatment of mesoscale temperature profile corrugation and microscale turbulence. We argue that inhomogeneous mixing of the turbulence corrugates the mean temperature profile and that the temperature corrugation then induces subcritical bifurcation of the turbulence. Thus, the system will transition from a metastable “laminar” state to an absolutely stable, excited state. Incorporating spatial coupling of the locally excited turbulent regions, a front forms. This front connects the excited and laminar states and penetrates the linear stable region efficiently. Here, we argue that such bistable turbulence spreading can explain observations of hysteresis in the intensity of L-mode core turbulence.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

DOE OSTI2018

Particle-in-cell studies of fast-ion slowing-down rates in cool tenuous magnetized plasma

We report on 3D-3V particle-in-cell simulations of fast-ion energy-loss rates in a cold, weakly-magnetized, weakly-coupled plasma where the electron gyroradius, ρe, is comparable to or less than the Debye length, λ De , and the fast-ion velocity exceeds the electron thermal velocity, a regime in which the electron response may be impeded. These simulations use explicit algorithms, spatially resolve ρ e and λ De , and temporally resolve the electron cyclotron and plasma frequencies. For mono-energetic dilute fast ions with isotropic velocity distributions, these scaling studies of the slowing-down time, τ s , versus fast-ion charge are in agreement with unmagnetized slowing-down theory; with an applied magnetic field, no consistent anisotropy between τs in the cross-field and field-parallel directions could be resolved. Scaling the fast-ion charge is confirmed as a viable way to reduce the required computational time for each simulation. In conclusion, the implications of these slowing down processes are described for one magnetic-confinement fusion concept, the small, advanced-fuel, field-reversed configuration device.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗