On the thermal dynamic behaviour of the helium-cooled DEMO fusion reactor

The EU-DEMO conceptual design is being conducted among research institutions and universities from 26 countries of European Union, Switzerland and Ukraine. Its mission is to realise electricity from nuclear fusion reaction by 2050. As DEMO has been conceived to deliver net electricity to the grid, the choice of the Breeding Blanket (BB) coolant plays a pivotal role in the reactor design having a strong influence on plant operation, safety and maintenance. In particular, due to the pulsed nature of the heat source, the Primary Heat Transfer System (PHTS) becomes a very important actor of the Balance of Plant (BoP) together with the Power Conversion System (PCS). Moreover, aiming to mitigate the potential negative impact of plasma pulsing on BoP equipment, for the DEMO plant is also being investigated a "heat transfer chain" option which envisages an Intermediate Heat Transfer System (IHTS) equipped with an Energy Storage System (ESS) between PHTS and PCS. Within this framework, a preliminary study has been carried out to analyse the thermal dynamic behaviour of the IHTS system for the Helium-Cooled Pebble Bed (HCPB) BB concept during pulse/dwell transition which should be still considered as the normal operating mode of a fusion power plant. Starting from preliminary thermal-hydraulic calculations made in order to size the main BoP components, the global performances of DEMO BoP have been quantitatively assessed focusing the attention on the attitude of the whole IHTS to smooth the sudden power variations which come from the plasma. The paper describes criteria and rationale followed to develop a numerical model which manages to simulate simple transient scenarios of DEMO BoP. Results of numerical simulations are presented and critically discussed in order to point out the main issues that DEMO BoP has to overcome to achieve a viable electricity power output

Muon and Tau Neutrinos Spectra from Solar Flares

Solar neutrino flares and mixing are considered. Most power-full solar flare as the ones occurred on 23th February 1956, September 29th 1989, 28th October and on 2nd-4th November 2003 are sources of cosmic rays, X, gamma and neutrino bursts. These flares took place both on front or in the edge and in the hidden solar disk. The observed and estimated total flare energy should be a source of a prompt secondary neutrino burst originated, by proton-proton-pion production on the sun itself; a more delayed and spread neutrino flux signal arise by the solar charged flare particles reaching the terrestrial atmosphere. Our first estimates of neutrino signals in largest underground detectors hint for few events in correlation with, gamma,radio onser. Our approximated spectra for muons and taus from these rare solar eruption are shown over the most common background. The muon and tau signature is very peculiar and characteristic over electron and anti-electron neutrino fluxes. The rise of muon neutrinos will be detectable above the minimal muon threshold of 113 MeV. The rarest tau appearence will be possible only for hardest solar neutrino energies above 3.471 GeVComment: 14 pages, 4 figures, Vulcano Conference 200

Editorial: Exploring system justification phenomenon among disadvantaged individuals

The question of why (or even when) the disadvantaged might be more or less supportive of existing social arrangements is a matter of debate amongst social and political psychologists (e.g., Passini, 2019; Jost, 2020, see also Rubin et al., 2022). Accordingly, for this Research Topic, we chose a title that was deliberately broad in scope, accommodating several aspects that included: (a) the drivers of system justification; (b) the socio-structural conditions that enhance or dampen system justification, (c) the ideological correlates of system support, and (d) the impact of system justification on wellbeing. Taken together, the contributions comprised in this Research Topic provide a comprehensive analysis of these four issues

Winter 1974

DELEGATION--A Path to Satisfied Employees and Increased Productivity (page 3) UMass Herbicide Evaluations (4) Turf News (5) Heating Elements (8) Back and Beyond (10) Turf Grass Contributions (20

Feasibility interventional study investigating PAIN in neurorehabilitation through wearabLE SensorS (PAINLESS): a study protocol

Introduction: Millions of people survive injuries to the central or peripheral nervous system for which neurorehabilitation is required. In addition to the physical and cognitive impairments, many neurorehabilitation patients experience pain, often not widely recognised and inadequately treated. This is particularly true for multiple sclerosis (MS) patients, for whom pain is one of the most common symptoms. In clinical practice, pain assessment is usually conducted based on a subjective estimate. This approach can lead to inaccurate evaluations due to the influence of numerous factors, including emotional or cognitive aspects. To date, no objective and simple to use clinical methods allow objective quantification of pain and the diagnostic differentiation between the two main types of pain (nociceptive vs neuropathic). Wearable technologies and artificial intelligence (AI) have the potential to bridge this gap by continuously monitoring patients' health parameters and extracting meaningful information from them. Therefore, we propose to develop a new automatic AI-powered tool to assess pain and its characteristics during neurorehabilitation treatments using physiological signals collected by wearable sensors. Methods and analysis: We aim to recruit 15 participants suffering from MS undergoing physiotherapy treatment. During the study, participants will wear a wristband for three consecutive days and be monitored before and after their physiotherapy sessions. Measurement of traditionally used pain assessment questionnaires and scales (ie, painDETECT, Doleur Neuropathique 4 Questions, EuroQoL-5-dimension-3-level) and physiological signals (photoplethysmography, electrodermal activity, skin temperature, accelerometer data) will be collected. Relevant parameters from physiological signals will be identified, and AI algorithms will be used to develop automatic classification methods. Ethics and dissemination: The study has been approved by the local Ethical Committee (285-2022-SPER-AUSLBO). Participants are required to provide written informed consent. The results will be disseminated through contributions to international conferences and scientific journals, and they will also be included in a doctoral dissertation. Trial registration number: NCT05747040

Development of a thermal-hydraulic model of the EU-DEMO Water Cooled Lithium Lead Breeding Blanket Primary Heat Transport System

The EUROfusion consortium is developing the project of a DEMOnstration Fusion Reactor (EU-DEMO) which would follow ITER in the pathway towards the quest for the exploitation of fusion energy. EU-DEMO has been conceived to deliver net electric power to the grid. Therefore, proper critical evaluations of the tokamak cooling and power conversion systems are needed because they play a pivotal role in the design and licencing of the overall plant. The EU-DEMO reactor will be based on the tokamak concept and, as such, it is supposed to undergo a pulsed duty cycle under normal conditions, which might challenge the qualified lifetime of the main equipment inducing undue thermal and mechanical cycling. Moreover, the EU-DEMO plasma control strategy postulates the possible occurrence of planned and off-normal plasma overpower transients that might jeopardise the structural integrity of the plasma facing components. It is, therefore, of paramount importance to have appropriate tools to reproduce the thermal-hydraulic behaviour of tokamak cooling systems during major operational and accidental scenarios in a realistic and reliable way. In this context, University of Palermo in cooperation with EUROfusion has developed a finite volume model of the Primary Heat Transport System (PHTS) feeding the EU-DEMO Water Cooled Lithium Lead Breeding Blanket (WCLL BB). The activity has been led following a theoretical–computational approach based on the adoption of the TRACE thermal-hydraulic system code. Particular attention has been paid to capturing all the main geometrical, hydraulic and heat transfer features characterising both in-vessel and ex-vessel components. Preliminary analyses have also been carried out to check the code's predictive potential in fusion relevant applications. Models, assumptions, and outcomes of the analyses are herewith reported and critically discussed

QAPgrid: A Two Level QAP-Based Approach for Large-Scale Data Analysis and Visualization

Background: The visualization of large volumes of data is a computationally challenging task that often promises rewarding new insights. There is great potential in the application of new algorithms and models from combinatorial optimisation. Datasets often contain “hidden regularities” and a combined identification and visualization method should reveal these structures and present them in a way that helps analysis. While several methodologies exist, including those that use non-linear optimization algorithms, severe limitations exist even when working with only a few hundred objects. Methodology/Principal Findings: We present a new data visualization approach (QAPgrid) that reveals patterns of similarities and differences in large datasets of objects for which a similarity measure can be computed. Objects are assigned to positions on an underlying square grid in a two-dimensional space. We use the Quadratic Assignment Problem (QAP) as a mathematical model to provide an objective function for assignment of objects to positions on the grid. We employ a Memetic Algorithm (a powerful metaheuristic) to tackle the large instances of this NP-hard combinatorial optimization problem, and we show its performance on the visualization of real data sets. Conclusions/Significance: Overall, the results show that QAPgrid algorithm is able to produce a layout that represents the relationships between objects in the data set. Furthermore, it also represents the relationships between clusters that are feed into the algorithm. We apply the QAPgrid on the 84 Indo-European languages instance, producing a near-optimal layout. Next, we produce a layout of 470 world universities with an observed high degree of correlation with the score used by the Academic Ranking of World Universities compiled in the The Shanghai Jiao Tong University Academic Ranking of World Universities without the need of an ad hoc weighting of attributes. Finally, our Gene Ontology-based study on Saccharomyces cerevisiae fully demonstrates the scalability and precision of our method as a novel alternative tool for functional genomics