First fusion proton measurements in TEXTOR plasmas using activation technique

MeV particle loss measurements from fusion plasmas, in particular alpha particles, remain difficult in large fusion devices and further R&D is needed for ITER. This paper describes the first attempt to measure 3 MeV escaping fusion protons emitted from TEXTOR tokamak plasmas using activation technique. This technique was successfully demonstrated, initially, in 2006 on the JET tokamak. An ion camera equipped with a collimator and several types of activation detectors was installed inside the TEXTOR vacuum vessel to perform these measurements. After irradiation, the detectors were analyzed using ultra low level gamma-ray spectrometry at the HADES underground laboratory. 3MeV escaping fusion protons were detected in larger number −~6 times more - compared to earlier measurements using this technique on JET. Another major progress was the reduction of the cooling time by a factor of 50, which made possible to detect radionuclides with half-life of less than 90 min.

BONHEURE Georges;  MLYNAR J.;  VAN WASSENHOVE G.;  HULT Mikael;  GONZALEZ DE ORDUNA R.;  LUTTER Guillaume;  VERMAERCKE P.;  HUBER A.;  SCHWEER B.;  ESSER G.;  BIEL W.; 

2013-02-06

AMER INST PHYSICS

JRC79518

0034-6748,   

http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4739228,    https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC79518,   

10.1063/1.4739228,