The first Progress Meeting of the bilateral IRFM/SWIP collaboration was successfully held on October 18 in Chengdu, on the sidelines of the IAEA-FEC, International Conference on Fusion Energy.
The meeting brought together around 30 participants, including 11 experts from IRFM. It began with a visit to the new Yongxing campus, which houses the laboratory’s new headquarters and its Nuclear Fusion Technology R&D Center.
During a working session co-chaired by Deputy Director General Qingchuan Chen and Jérôme Bucalossi, participants reviewed the progress of three ongoing research projects focusing on ELM control using SMBI*, integrated modeling and analysis of experiments on HL-3 and WEST tokamaks, and the design of the HL-3 visible/infrared system.
New activities of mutual interest were also identified, including:
- the operation of ion cyclotron frequency (ICRF) heating systems;
- system code aspects with SYCOMORE;
- training teams in the use of modeling codes;
- the opportunity for a new supersonic molecular injector for the WEST divertor;
- the development of XPR scenarios (for “X-point radiator,” which refers to a localized area of intense radiation near the X-point and helps redistribute thermal power).
Discussions will continue in the coming weeks and should lead to the signing of new Specific Topics of Cooperation to implement these new projects.
*SMBI: supersonic molecular beam injection
