SBIR-STTR Award

Development of an economically and environmentally attractive fusion energy source is the goal of the Fusion Energy Sciences program. One of the main approaches for plasma heating and current drive in fusion devices is to use the radio frequency waves. Radio frequency waves are used for heating and/or current drive in most magnetic plasma confinement devices, such as Tokamaks, Reversed Field Pinches, Stellarators and Mirror Machines, and also they are used in the industrial plasma sources. Numerical modeling of radio frequency fields in both the fusion and in the industrial plasma devices is a very important part of analysis of performance of such devices. We will develop a new parallelized full wave radio frequency code to accurately model 3-dimensional radio frequency fields in the fusion and in the industrial plasma devices. In the Phase I project it will be determined whether the approach to solve the 3- dimensional full wave equations, discretized in the configuration space and using the plasma conductivity kernel, by applying the Krylov subspace iterative methods is feasible with the modern computing power. In Phase I we will test the feasibility of calculation of the discretized plasma conductivity kernel in 3-dimensional configuration space by integrating Vlasov equation along unperturbed particles orbits. We will test the feasibility of solving the formulated linear full wave equations by the Krylov subspace iterative methods. These studies will be done by developing a parallel computer code using modern techniques and libraries. Commercial Applications and Other

Benefits:
The code will be used: in the design, operation and performance assessment of radio frequency systems in the existing and planned fusion devices; in the design, operation and performance assessment of the industrial radio frequency plasma devices; in the design, operation and performance assessment of the electron cyclotron ion sources; in conducting basic research on waves in plasmas.

Development of an economically and environmentally attractive fusion energy source is the goal of the Fusion Energy Sciences program. One main approach for plasma heating and current drive in fusion devices is to use radio frequency (RF) waves. RF waves are used for heating and/or current drive in most magnetic plasma confinement devices, such as Tokamaks, Reversed Field Pinches, Stellarators and Mirror Machines, and are also used in industrial plasma sources. Numerical modeling of RF fields in both fusion and industrial plasma devices is a very important part of analysis of performance of such devices. FAR-TECH, Inc. will develop a new parallelized full wave radio frequency code to accurately model 3-D radio frequency fields in fusion and industrial plasma devices. Feasibility study of the proposed approach of solving wave equations was performed in Phase I. Feasibility was demonstrated for numerical calculation of the plasma conductivity kernel in 3-D configuration space. Feasibility was demonstrated for solving linear equations, obtained by discretization of the wave equations using the meshless formulation, by the Krylov subspace iterative methods or by efficient direct solvers. The goal in Phase II is to develop a new parallel full wave linear RF code, which will utilize the localized nature of plasma dielectric response to the RF field, use adaptive grid to better resolve resonances in plasma and antenna structures, and solve the formulated linear equations by iterative methods or efficient direct solvers. The commercial product will be a user friendly numerical tool with a graphical user interface, comprehensive post processing, and a user manual. The code will be used: in the design, operation and performance assessment of radio frequency systems in existing and planned fusion devices, industrial radio frequency plasma devices, and electron cyclotron ion sources; in basic research on plasma waves.