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The plasma electron temperature of more than 100 million degrees has been reached in 2018 on EAST. Credit: EAST Team
The experimental advanced superconducting tokamak (EAST), dubbed the "Chinese artificial sun," has reached an electron temperature of more than 100 million degrees in its central plasma during a four month experiment this year . It's about seven times more than the interior of the sun, which is about 15 million degrees Celsius.
Experience shows that China is making significant progress in the production of Tokamak based fusion energy.
The experiment was conducted by the EAST team of the Hefei Institute of Physics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CASHIPS), in collaboration with national and international colleagues.
The plasma current density profile has been optimized through the effective integration and synergy of four types of heating power: lower hybrid wave heating, electron cyclotron heating, ion cyclotron resonance heating, and Neutral ion heating.
The power injection exceeded 10 MW and the energy stored in the plasma was increased to 300 kJ after scientists optimized the coupling of different heating techniques. The experiment used advanced plasma control and prediction theory / simulation.
Scientists conducted experiments on plasma equilibrium and instability, containment and transport, plasma-wall interaction and energetic particle physics to demonstrate H-mode operation at the state of balance over a long time with good impurity control, stability of the core / edge MHD, and heat escape with the help of a divertor in tungsten type ITER.
With ITER-like operating conditions such as radiofrequency dominant heating, reduced torque and water-cooled tungsten divertor, EAST has achieved a completely non-inductive stationary state scenario with extended performance. of high density fusion, high delivery.
Extension of the EAST operational scenario in 2018, comparing its enhanced energy confinement factor with the ITER baseline scenario. Credit: EAST Team
At the same time, to solve the particle and power exhaust problems, which are essential for high-performance steady-state operations, the EAST team has used many techniques to control localized modes at the edges and the tungsten impurity with metal walls, as well as active control of the retractor. thermal load.
Operating scenarios including the high-performance state-of-the-equilibrium mode and electron temperatures of over 100 million degrees on EAST have made unique contributions to ITER at the reactor Chinese Fusion Engineering Test (CFETR) and DEMO.
These results provide key data for validation of current heat, transport and entrainment models. They also increase confidence in the CFETR merger performance forecast.
Currently, the physical design of the CFETR focuses on the optimization of a third evolution machine with a large radium at 7 m, a minor radium at 2 m, a toroildal magnetic field of 6.5-7 Tesla and a 13 MA plasma stream.
In order to support the technical development of CFETR and the future DEMO, a new national mega-science project – the comprehensive research center – will be launched at the end of this year.
This new project will advance the development of tritium coverage test modules, superconducting technology, actuators and reactive heating and current control sources for reactors, as well as deflection materials.
EAST is the world's first superconducting tokamak with a non-circular cross section. It was designed and built by China focusing on key scientific issues related to the application of fusion energy. Since it was commissioned in 2006, EAST has become a fully open testing center where the global fusion community can conduct steady-state operations and physics research related to ITER.
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EAST performs the longest operations in permanent H mode
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