Keynote: Diagnostic Models for Nuclear Fusion

Fusion reactors consist of components such as heating and current drive systems, first wall components, and tritium breeding blankets. Monitoring and safely controlling these components requires diagnostic models that can reliably measure signals and convert them to physically meaningful values.

In this keynote talk from COMSOL Day: Nuclear Fusion, Cornwall Lau of Oak Ridge National Laboratory details the importance of these diagnostic models and how they can be used to better understand fusion energy components. He opens his talk with a brief explanation of a magnetic nuclear fusion energy reactor. Then he shares three diagnostic models created within the COMSOL Multiphysics^® software, which are used for measuring:

• Radio frequency fields in plasmas using visible spectroscopy
• Heat flux profiles on first wall components using infrared cameras
• Flow velocities in liquid metal loops using an eddy current flowmeter

Cornwall Lau is a R&D staff member at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. He works on heating and current drive as well as plasma material interactions for many fusion experiments worldwide.