Sustained Neutron Production from a Sheared-Flow Stabilized 
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 Pinch

Zhang, Y.; Shumlak, U.; Nelson, B. A.; Golingo, R.P.; Weber, T. R.; Stepanov, Anton; Claveau, E.L.; Forbes, Eleanor; Draper, Z. T.; Mitrani, James; McLean, H. S.; Tummel, Kurt; Higginson, Drew; Cooper, C. M.

doi:10.1103/physrevlett.122.135001

Cited by 49 publications

(19 citation statements)

References 34 publications

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“…The rapid progress for a modest investment in ALPHA is promising, but a great deal more development is required before any of these concepts can be established as viable candidates for fusion energy. In particular, the stabilized Z pinch is showing strong experimental evidence of achieving plasmas with both Te and Ti exceeding 500 eV, which hopefully will be confirmed soon by direct diagnostic measurements [29]. In the sixty-plus years of controlled fusion research, only a very small handful of fusion configurations have exceeded this metric, typically at much greater investments.…”

Section: After Alphamentioning

confidence: 90%

Retrospective of the ARPA-E ALPHA Fusion Program

et al. 2019

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This paper provides a retrospective of the ALPHA (Accelerating Low-cost Plasma Heating and Assembly) fusion program of the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) of the U.S. Department of Energy. ALPHA's objective was to catalyze research and development efforts to enable substantially lower-cost pathways to economical fusion power. To do this in a targeted, focused program, ALPHA focused on advancing the science and technology of pulsed, intermediate-density fusion approaches, including magneto-inertial fusion and Z-pinch variants, that have the potential to scale to commercially viable fusion power plants. The paper includes a discussion of the origins and framing of the ALPHA program, a summary of project status and outcomes, a description of associated technology-transition activities, and thoughts on a potential follow-on ARPA-E fusion program. Introduction:In 2014 the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) launched a new research program on low-cost approaches to fusion-energy development [1]. The "Accelerating Low-Cost Plasma Heating and Assembly" (ALPHA) program set out to enable more rapid progress towards fusion energy by establishing a wider range of technological options that could be pursued with smaller, lower-cost experiments, short development and construction times, and high experimental throughput. Mainstream fusion research generally refers to magnetically or inertially confined fusion, both of which require expensive facilities for reasons briefly described below and explored in more detail in several books[2] [3]. ALPHA focused on magneto-inertial fusion (MIF), a class of pulsed fusion approaches with fuel densities in between those of magnetic and inertial fusion[4], [5] [6]. This paper presents a brief background on the origins of the ALPHA program, the results achieved by ALPHA-funded teams, and a look ahead to potential next steps for low-cost fusion development. OriginsARPA-E's mission is to develop transformational new energy technologies [7]. While DOE has pursued fusion energy as a potentially transformational opportunity for decades, ARPA-E had not supported any work in fusion prior to the ALPHA program. This was in part due to a perception that fusion was inherently the realm of "big science" and that ARPA-E, which runs relatively small, targeted, short-term programs across a wide spectrum of energy technologies-did not have a role to play in that development. In launching ALPHA, ARPA-E sought to change this dynamic and bring new players into the field -both in terms of the kinds of teams doing fusion development (e.g., smaller groups and private startups), and in terms of the sources of funding (e.g., private investors). The ALPHA program

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Section: After Alphamentioning

confidence: 90%

Retrospective of the ARPA-E ALPHA Fusion Program

et al. 2019

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“…Azimuthal magnetic field and mode amplitude is measured using a multiple axial arrays of surface-mounted magnetic probes. Plasma density is measured by a digital holographic interferometer and the plasma temperature is measured by Doppler broadening via impurity ion emission spectroscopy [44]. .…”

Section: Shearmentioning

confidence: 99%

Time-discretization of a plasma-neutral MHD model with a semi-implicit leapfrog algorithm

Taheri¹,

King²,

Shumlak³

2022

Computer Physics Communications

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“…While fusion neutrons were detected in some of the earliest Z-pinch experiments, those fusion reactions were found to be the result of plasma instabilities generating non-thermal beamtarget fusion events [109], which would not scale up to energy breakeven. More recently, however, stabilized Zpinch experiments have provided evidence of sustained thermonuclear neutron production [76,110]. Z-pinch plasmas exhibit profile effects perpendicular to the direction of current flow so the profile considerations discussed in Section 4.1 apply to Z pinches as well.…”

Section: Z Pinchmentioning

confidence: 99%

Progress toward fusion energy breakeven and gain as measured against the Lawson criterion

Wurzel,

Hsu

2021

Preprint

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The Lawson criterion is a key concept in the pursuit of fusion energy, relating the fuel density n, (energy) confinement time τ , and fuel temperature T to the energy gain Q of a fusion plasma. The purpose of this paper is to explain and review the Lawson criterion and to provide a compilation of achieved parameters for a broad range of historical and contemporary fusion experiments. Although this paper focuses on the Lawson criterion, it is only one of many equally important factors in assessing the progress and ultimate likelihood of any fusion concept becoming a commercially viable fusion energy system. Only experimentally measured or inferred values of n, τ , and T that have been published in the peer-reviewed literature are included in this paper. For extracting these parameters, we discuss methodologies that are necessarily specific to different fusion approaches (including magnetic, inertial, and magneto-inertial fusion). This paper is intended to serve as a reference for fusion researchers and a tutorial for all others interested in fusion energy.

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Sustained Neutron Production from a Sheared-Flow Stabilized Z Pinch

Cited by 49 publications

References 34 publications

Retrospective of the ARPA-E ALPHA Fusion Program

Retrospective of the ARPA-E ALPHA Fusion Program

Time-discretization of a plasma-neutral MHD model with a semi-implicit leapfrog algorithm

Progress toward fusion energy breakeven and gain as measured against the Lawson criterion

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