Présenté par / Presented by :
George Tynan, MIT NSE Department, Adjunct Professor of Nuclear Science and Engineering
Résumé / Abstract :
The talk will review candidate low-activation materials, irradiation-driven lifetime limits, end-of-life activation, and implications for tritium breeding and inventory. Emerging U.S. research efforts—including POSEIDON at UC San Diego and LMNT at MIT — will be discussed in the context of multi-effect irradiation experiments, validated predictive models, and materials-by-design. Finally, the talk will consider the complementary need to avoid damaging off-normal plasma events through robust control of disruptions, vertical displacement events, tearing modes, and edge-localized modes, including alternative edge-control strategies. Motivated by these considerations, we conclude with an argument that the negative-triangularity tokamak provides an attractive configuration that should be developed in a reactor-scale device. Together, these issues define the coupled physics, materials, and economic challenges that must be solved for fusion to become a durable and competitive energy source.