University of Tennessee, Knoxville (UTK) contribution to: Deciphering the role of mixed-material deposition and temperature on lithium-coated PFCs in NSTX-U high-performance plasmas: Collaborative UIUC & UTK Proposal (Final Report)
This report describes the final product of model development to decipher the role of mixed material deposition and temperature on lithium-coated PFCs in NSTX-U. The computational modeling approach used to address these specific questions involved a pragmatic multiscale materials modeling framework, with the use of reaction-diffusion based continuum simulations, through modifications to the SDTrimSP code. This pragmatic modeling was supplemented with a few, select parametric ab-initio and molecular dynamics simulations, to investigate the effect of lithium and mixed lithium-carbon-refractory metal chemistry and surface morphology and chemistry on erosion yields and deuterium uptake, including the role of temperature and boronization. The main progress of the project was to develop the major framework and structure of the model, although validated application of the model was limited as a result of the unplanned shutdown and outage of NSTX-U.