New cloud-based computing platform for fusion research

Since June Culham Centre for Fusion Energy (CCFE) provides a new facility to fusion scientists, named the CUMULUS Modular Data Centre. The centre contains a new cloud-based computing platform that promises to process scientific data quicker, cheaper and more accurately than ever before.

Scientific computing is an essential technology for assimilating and understanding the large quantities of data that are now commonplace in the fusion community, as well as carrying out complex predictive simulations of tokamak plasmas. To give an idea of where we are heading, the next-generation fusion experiment ITER will generate 2 petabytes of raw data each day (2,000 trillion bytes), more than JET has produced in its entire 34-year history!

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Visit to JET

JET – Aerial view. Photo: EFDA-JET

During the two-week Culham Plasma Physics Summer School organized at Culham Science Center, UK, one of the most expected moments is the visit to Joint European Torus (JET). JET is the world’s largest operational magnetically confined plasma physics experiment. It is based on a tokamak design and is the direct predecessor to ITER, which should be operative in 2025.

JET runs only during some seconds at the time and thereafter it must rest about 20min before a new run. In a good operative day, about 20 runs are carried out. These runs are made for experimentation and no electricity is produced. However, a lot of energy is required (about a 1% of the total energy used at a given moment in the UK). This is why a direct phone line from London to the JET control room can ring at any moment, kindly requesting to stop experiments.

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Group member defends his thesis

Our Fusion group member Marc Fuster has successfully presented his final Bachelor thesis in Physics entitled “Application of the Edge-Based Finite Element Method for fusion plasma simulation” based on the work he has been carrying out since last August in our group under supervision of Dr Shimpei Futatani. The defense took place at the Faculty of Sciences of Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Spain.

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Wendelstein 7-X achieves a stellarator world record

Inside view the plasma vessel with graphite tile cladding. Photo: IPP

In the past experimentation round, Wendelstein 7-X achieved the stellarators’ world record for the fusion product as a result of reaching higher temperatures and densities of the plasma as well as longer pulses. Wendelstein 7-X attained a fusion product of 6·1026 degrees x second per cubic metre which is the world’s stellarator record and gives first confirmation that the optimisation carried out for its design has been successful.

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Presentation of our research results at 45th EPS Conference on Plasma Physics

The 45th European Physical Society Conference on Plasma Physics took place in Prague, Czech Republic, from the 2nd to the 6th of July, 2018. It is the largest annual conference in the field organized in Europe. This year the conference attracted a record number of more than 850 registered participants throughout the world. Our group leader Prof. Mervi Mantsinen chaired the magnetic confinement fusion plasma section of the Program Committee.

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