Study of molecules created during erosion of fusion device walls

What is it about?

Chemistry is not something which is most considered when we talk about the fusion devices, but the wall erosion is a crucial part of any device development, and large part of it (up to 30%) is due to chemistry – creation of hydride molecules. Our work is to study and potentially find a way to suppress the erosion to manageable levels. In this publication we compare molecules created during interactions of the fusion plasma in different hydrogen isotopes with beryllium walls, checking if their spectra suggest any kinds of dependencies of the properties of created molecules on engineering parameters – gas density, wall temperature, hydrogen isotope. It appears, that the dependencies, if not very strong, are measurable and suggest, that the changes in chemistry should be incorporated in the modelling of the wall erosion and taken into account during experiments and engineering development of the fusion devices.

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Photo by Timothy Dykes on Unsplash

Photo by Timothy Dykes on Unsplash

Why is it important?

Erosion of the vessel walls is a crucial part of development of the fusion device (potentially – up to fusion power plant). It decides how long the vessel will survive, how long before you need to go in (or send a robot) to repair something. Understanding the physical and chemical part of it, having the data for modeling makes it easier to combat it, and prolong the lifetime of the wall. If we want to build a fusion power plant (everybody does), we have to do it.

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