ITER breeding blanket design

A breeding blanket design has been developed for ITER to provide the necessary tritium fuel to achieve the technical objectives of the Enhanced Performance Phase. It uses a ceramic breeder and water coolant for compatibility with the ITER machine design of the Basic Performance Phase. Lithium zirconate and lithium oxide am the selected ceramic breeders based on the current data base. Enriched lithium and beryllium neutron multiplier are used for both breeders. Both forms of beryllium material, blocks and pebbles are used at different blanket locations based on thermo-mechanical considerations and beryllium thickness requirements. Type 316LN austenitic steel is used as structural material similar to the shielding blanket. Design issues and required R&D data are identified during the development of the design

Thermal diffusivity and Biot number: a new experimental method

A new simple method is presented for measuring thermal diffusivity and Biot number in cylindrical samples made of relatively highly conducting materials, subjected to laminar air flow. The basic idea is a heat source in the middle section of the sample, acting also as a thermocouple; only one additional temperature sensor at the cylinder basis is required to give all information, without requiring any hypothesis about the effective time dependence of the heat source