Tomographic Imaging in Aditya

Tokamak

Nitin Jain

DivyaDrishti, Nuclear Engineering and Technology Programme

Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur
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Acknowledgements

• Prof. Prabhat Munshi

Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur

• Dr. C. V. S. Rao
Institute for Plasma Research Gandhinagar

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Outline

1. Energy Demands : Increasing

2. Near Term Solution : Fission
3. Long Term Solution : Fusion
4. Confinement of Plasma : Major Issues
– Instabilities and Impurities
5. Online Feedback Needed for “Selective” Heating
6. Stable Power Supply from Fusion Reactor

Role of tomography is in step 5

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 (1) D+D → T (1.01 MeV) + p (3.03
Fusion
MeV)
(2) D+D → He3 (0.82 MeV) + n (2.45
MeV)
(3) D+T → He4 (3.52 MeV) + n (14.06
MeV)
(4) D + He3 → He4 (3.67 MeV) + p (14.67
MeV)

For(5) Li6 + n → T + Hecross

+ (4.8 MeV)
4
D-T reaction: Largest section
(6) Energy
Li7 + n → T + Hereleased
4 highest
+ n – (2.5 MeV)

Why is fusion power attractive?

• Fuel is widely available

• Reaction is relatively clean
• Low cost
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Thermo Nuclear Fusion

• D-T mixture to be heated to 100 million degrees in order to

overcome Coulomb repulsion

• Why Plasma is required?

• Necessary conditions for fusion

• Temperature
• Density
• Confinement

These simultaneous conditions are represented by a fourth state of

matter called PLASMA.

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Fusion Reactor

An electric power plant based upon a fusion reactor

Plasma Confinement
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Magnetic Confinement: Tokamak

• A tokamak is a plasma
confinement device invented in
the 1950s

• Plasma is confined here by

magnetic fields.

• The magnetic fields in a tokamak

are produced by a combination of

Courtesy: www.jet.efda.org
currents flowing in external coils Magnetic circuit of JET tokamak
and currents flowing within the
plasma itself

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Experimental tokamaks: Currently in operation

• T-10, in Kurchatov Institute, Moscow, Russia (formerly Soviet Union); 2 MW; 1975
• TEXTOR, in Jülich, Germany; 1978
• Joint European Torus (JET), in Culham, United Kingdom; 16 MW; 1983
• CASTOR in Prague, Czech Republic; 1983 after reconstruction from Soviet TM-1-MH
• JT-60, in Naka, Ibaraki Prefecture, Japan; 1985
• STOR-M, University of Saskatchewan; Canada 1987; first demonstration of alternating
current in a tokamak.
• Tore Supra, at the CEA, Cadarache, France; 1988
• Aditya, at Institute for Plasma Research (IPR) in Gujarat, India; 1989
• DIII-D,[4] in San Diego, USA; operated by General Atomics since the late 1980s
• FTU, in Frascati, Italy; 1990
• ASDEX Upgrade, in Garching, Germany; 1991
• Alcator C-Mod, MIT, Cambridge, USA; 1992
• Tokamak à configuration variable (TCV), at the EPFL, Switzerland; 1992
• TCABR, at the University of Sao Paulo, Sao Paulo, Brazil; this tokamak was
transferred from Centre des Recherches en Physique des Plasmas in Switzerland;
1994.
• HT-7, in Hefei, China; 1995
• MAST, in Culham, United Kingdom; 1999
• UCLA Electric Tokamak, in Los Angeles, United States; 1999
• EAST (HT-7U), in Hefei, China; 2006

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Experimental tokamaks: Planned

• KSTAR, in Daejon, South Korea; start of operation expected in 2008

• ITER, in Cadarache, France; 500 MW; start of operation expected in 2016
• SST-1, in Institute for Plasma Research Gandhinagar, India; 1000 seconds operation;
currently being assembled

 ITER

Official objective
"demonstrate the scientific and technological feasibility of fusion
energy for peaceful purposes"

Participants
European Union (EU), India, Japan, People's Republic of China, Russia, South
Korea, and USA

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Indian Nuclear Fusion Program: Aditya Tokamak

Courtesy: www.ipr.res.in
Major radius = 0.75 m
Minor radius = 0.25 m
Maximum toroidal magnetic field = 1.2 T
Currents = 80-100 kA
Plasma discharges duration ~ 100 ms
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Problems in Confinement of Plasma

• Plasma Instabilities
• Impurities

• How do we measure impurities in plasma?

• Can we see various plasma instabilities non-invasively?

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Role of Plasma Tomography in Fusion
• Tomography is the only tool to give non-invasive point wise information
about instabilities
• Diagnostics paint a picture of plasma evolution
Diagnostics Measurement Information
Soft x-ray X-ray emissivity contours Thermal instability, tearing modes, Sawtooth
tomography activity, internal disruptions, &
Major disruptions
Microwave Phase change through Evolution of electron density
interferometer plasma
Optical tomography Visible radiation profile Density profile modification & micro instability
stabilization
Hard X-ray Fast electron production Steady state operation of tokamaks & LHCD
tomography and confinement performance
Gamma-ray -ray emission profile Radial distribution of fast ions
tomography
Neutron tomography Generation and volume Fish-bone instability, burst of neutron emission
distribution of neutrons & fusion reaction monitoring

Bolometry Radiation profile and radial Radiative instability, MARFE, & MERFE
tomography distribution

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 Soft X-ray Tomography

Soft x-ray tomography gives measure of

 Plasma density
 Temperature of Plasma
 Impurities in Plasma
 Determination of position and shape of
Plasma
 Determination of radial current distribution

Courtesy: www.jet.efda.org
These X-rays are utilized to study MHD
Phenomena

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Chord Segment Inversion (CSI) Algorithm

L max
f  p,     g  r,  ds L j 1
L p , L j
k
L k j

d   g  r ,   ds
 j 1
C C
L 0
B B
L o
Plasma
m
dk   Sk , j g j k  1,2,......., m Detectors
j 1

j th ring ( j  1)th ring

S k , j = length of the segment of the k th ray falling in j th ring

= BC  BC 
g j = average value of g in j thring
m = number of rings assumed within the object.

If the emissivity is circularly symmetric, g will be a function of r alone.

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Chord Segment Inversion (CSI) Algorithm
 d    S  g 
Where
 d    d m , d m 1,..........d1  Data vector
Emissivity
[ g ]   g m , g m 1 ,..........g1  vector
 Sm, n 0 0 
S S m 1, m 1  
 m 1, m
    
S   
    
    
 
 S1, m S 2, m 1 S1,1 

 g    S  1  d 
• Reconstructed emissivity values from CSI algorithm are fitted in
phenomenological curve

 r2 
g (r )  g (0) 1  2 
 a 

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Results: Radial Profile of Emissivity

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Emissivity Reconstructed Images

(Shot # 13127)
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Variation of Emissivity with Time

(Shot # 13127)
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Emissivity, Alpha and Plasma current w.r.t. Time

(Shot # 13127)
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Conclusions

• Experimental results indicate a successful adaptation of the

tomography technique for the analysis of events occurring during a
plasma discharge

• Reconstructed profiles can be used to study the sawtooth instability,

major and minor disruptions, impurity transport, and the phenomena
following pellet injection

• Profile peakedness parameter () can be used to predict information

about the evolution phase of the discharge and termination phase

• CSI algorithm has given very good results in reconstruction of

emissivity and can be used for real time tomography in fusion
experiments

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Thank You

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