On the mechanisms governing gas penetration into a tokamak plasma during a massive gas injection

A new 1D radial fluid code, IMAGINE, is used to simulate the penetration of gas into a tokamak plasma during a massive gas injection (MGI). The main result is that the gas is in general strongly braked as it reaches the plasma, due to mechanisms related to charge exchange and (to a smaller extent) recombination. As a result, only a fraction of the gas penetrates into the plasma. Also, a shock wave is created in the gas which propagates away from the plasma, braking and compressing the incoming gas. Simulation results are quantitatively consistent, at least in terms of orders of magnitude, with experimental data for a D 2 MGI into a JET Ohmic plasma. Simulations of MGI into the background plasma surrounding a runaway electron beam show that if the background electron density is too high, the gas may not penetrate, suggesting a possible explanation for the recent results of Reux et al in JET (2015 Nucl. Fusion 55 093013)

Size, Shape, and Crystallinity of Luminescent Structures in Oxidized Si Nanoclusters and H-Passivated Porous Si

Near-edge and extended x-ray absorption fine structure measurements from a wide variety of H-passivated porous Si samples and oxidized Si nanocrystals, combined with electron microscopy, ir-absorption, {alpha}-recoil, and luminescence emission data, provide a consistent structural picture of the species responsible for the luminescence observed in these systems. For luminescent porous Si samples peaking in the visible region, i. e., {le}700nm, their mass-weighted-average structures are determined here to be particles - not wires, whose short-range character is crystalline - not amorphous, and whose dimensions - typically <15 {angstrom} - are significantly smaller than previously reported or proposed. These results depend only on sample luminescence behavior, not on sample preparation details, and thus have general implications in describing the mechanism responsible for visible luminescence in porous silicon. New results are also presented which demonstrate that the observed luminescence is unrelated to either the photo-oxidized Si species in porous Si or the interfacial suboxide species in the Si nanocrystals

Unimportance of Siloxene in Luminescent Porous Silicon as Determined by Nexafs &amp; Exafs

AbstractNear-edge-- and extended--x-ray absorption fine structure measurements, as well as luminescence excitation and emission spectra, were obtained from samples of porous Si and siloxene. Contrary to a recently proposed explanation for the room temperature luminescence in porous Si, the combined data indicate that siloxene is not principally responsible for the observed effect.</jats:p

Observation of enhanced ion particle transport in mixed H/D isotope plasmas on JET

Particle transport in tokamak plasmas has been intensively studied in the past, particularly in relation to density peaking and the presence of anomalous inward particle convection in L- and H-modes. While in the L-mode case the presence of the anomalous inward pinch has previously been unambiguously demonstrated, particle transport in the H-mode was unclear. The main difficulty of such studies is that particle diffusion and convection could not be measured independently in steady-state conditions in the presence of a core particle flux. Therefore, it is usually not possible to separate the transport effect(inward convection), from the source effect (slow diffusion of particles introduced to the plasma core by neutral beam injection heating). In this work we describe experiments done on JET with mixtures of two hydrogenic isotopes: H and D. It is demonstrated that in the case of several ion species, convection and diffusion can be separated in a steady plasma without implementation of perturbative techniques such as gas puff modulation. Previous H-mode density peaking studies suggested that for this relatively high electron collisionality plasma scenario, the observed density gradient is mostly driven by particle source and low particle diffusivity D < 0.5 ∗ χ eff. Transport coefficients derived from observation of the isotope profiles in the new experiments far exceed that value - ion particle diffusion is found to be as high as D 2 ∗ χ eff, combined with a strong inward convection. Apparent disagreement with previous findings was explained by significantly faster transport of ion components with respect to the electrons, which could not be observed in a single main ion species plasma. This conclusion is confirmed by quasilinear gyrokinetic simulations

X-Ray Absorption spectroscopy from H-Passivated Porous Si and Oxidized Si Nanocrystals

AbstractQuantum confinement in nanoscale Si structures is widely believed to be responsible for the visible luminescence observed from anodically etched porous silicon (por-Si), but little is known about the actual size or shape of these structures. Extended x-ray absorption fine structure data from a wide variety of por-Si samples show significantly reduced average Si coordination numbers due to the sizable contribution of surface-coordinated H. (The H/Si ratios, as large as 1.2, were independently confirmed by ir-absorption and α-recoil measurements.) The Si coordinations imply very large surface/volume ratios, enabling the average Si structures to be identified as crystalline particles (not wires) whose dimensions are typically &lt;15 Å. Comparison of the size-dependent peak luminescence energies with those of oxidized Si nanocrystals, whose shapes are known, shows remarkable agreement. Furthermore, near-edge x-ray absorption fine structure measurements of the nanocrystals shows the outer oxide and interfacial suboxide layers to be constant over a wide range of nanocrystal sizes. The combination of these results effectively rules out surface species as being responsible for the observed visible luminescence in por-Si, and strongly supports quantum confinement as the dominant mechanism occurring in Si particles which are substantially smaller than previously reported or proposed.</jats:p

Predictive JET current ramp-up modelling using QuaLiKiz-neural-network

This work applies the coupled JINTRAC and QuaLiKiz-neural-network (QLKNN) model on the ohmic current ramp-up phase of a JET D discharge. The chosen scenario exhibits a hollow $T_\mathrm{e}$ profile attributed to core impurity accumulation, which is observed to worsen with the increasing fuel ion mass from D to T. A dynamic D simulation was validated, evolving j , $n_\mathrm{e}$ , $T_\mathrm{e}$ , $T_\mathrm{i}$ , n _Be , n _Ni , and n _W for 7.25 s along with self-consistent equilibrium calculations, and was consequently extended to simulate a pure T plasma in a predict-first exercise. The light impurity (Be) accounted for Z _eff while the heavy impurities (Ni, W) accounted for P _rad . This study reveals the role of transport on the $T_\mathrm{e}$ hollowing, which originates from the isotope effect on the electron-ion energy exchange affecting $T_\mathrm{i}$ . This exercise successfully affirmed isotopic trends from previous H experiments and provided engineering targets used to recreate the D q -profile in T experiments, demonstrating the potential of neural network surrogates for fast routine analysis and discharge design. However, discrepancies were found between the impurity transport behaviour of QuaLiKiz and QLKNN, which lead to notable $T_\mathrm{e}$ hollowing differences. Further investigation into the turbulent component of heavy impurity transport is recommended