Lower Hybrid antennas for nuclear fusion experiments

Author

Hillairet, J. ; Achard, J. ; Bae, Y.S. ; Bai, X. ; Balorin, C. ; Baranov, Y. ; Basiuk, V. ; Bécoulet, A. ; Belo, J. ; Berger-By, G. ; Bremond, Sylvain ; Castaldo, C. ; Ceccuzzi, S. ; Cesario, R. ; Corbel, E. ; Courtois, X. ; Decker, J. ; Delmas, E. ; Delp

Author_Institution

IRFM, CEA, St. Paul-lez-Durance, France

fYear

2012

fDate

26-30 March 2012

Firstpage

1

Lastpage

4

Abstract

The nuclear fusion research goal is to demonstrate the feasibility of fusion power for peaceful purposes. In order to achieve the conditions similar to those expected in an electricity-generating fusion power plant, plasmas with a temperature of several hundreds of millions of degrees must be generated and sustained for long periods. For this purpose, RF antennas delivering multi-megawatts of power to magnetized confined plasma are commonly used in experimental tokamaks. In the gigahertz range of frequencies, high power phased arrays known as “Lower Hybrid” (LH) antennas are used to extend the plasma duration. This paper reviews some of the technological aspects of the LH antennas used in the Tore Supra tokamak and presents the current design of a proposed 20 MW LH system for the international experiment ITER.

Keywords

Tokamak devices; antennas in plasma; fusion reactor design; plasma temperature; plasma toroidal confinement; plasma transport processes; ITER; RF antennas; Tore Supra tokamak; electricity-generating fusion power plant; fusion power feasibility; gigahertz frequency range; high power phased arrays; lower hybrid antennas; magnetized confined plasma; multimegawatt power; nuclear fusion; plasma temperature; power 20 MW; Current Drive; ITER; Lower Hybrid; Nuclear Fusion; Tore Supra; high power; phased array; rectangular waveguide;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Antennas and Propagation (EUCAP), 2012 6th European Conference on

Conference_Location

Prague

Print_ISBN

978-1-4577-0918-0

Electronic_ISBN

978-1-4577-0919-7

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/EuCAP.2012.6205828

Filename

6205828