Defense Intelligence Reference Document Inertial Electrostatic Confinement Fusion

Defense Intelligence Agency · 72 pages · text from the file's own layer

This Defense Intelligence Agency reference document, dated 10 March 2010, covers inertial electrostatic confinement (IEC) fusion. It was produced in FY 2009 under the DIA's Advanced Aerospace Weapon System Applications (AAWSA) program. The report focuses on work at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and reviews IEC basics, experiments, theory and applications such as neutron sources, explosives detection and space propulsion. It concludes by proposing a breakeven experiment for p-11B fusion that uses a hydrogen plasma simulation.

Open the PDF at page 26 Original source ↗

“The Times”31 pages

p. 8 …This is important for long run times since 10n bombardment of the grids, hence grid wire…
p. 9 …This time can be restated in terms of the number of ion recirculations in the IEC…
p. 15 …This work and others on the small gridded systems at that time showed several important problems…
p. 17 …interesting concept is the idea of ion focusing, either in space or time, or some other…
p. 18 …confinement time for aneutronic fusion. This assumes, however, very precise control is maintained over the energy…
p. 23 …By selecting the pulse width to match or exceed the ion confinement time, typically order of…
p. 27 …This is the approach used at the UIUC. However, introduction of the source into the configuration…
p. 30 …The second jet would serve the integration purpose of the platform without having to expend time…
p. 35 …The issue then is how to achieve adequate confinement times. The approach being pursued at UIUC…
p. 36 …step in a timely fashion, however. The Dipole Assisted IEC (DaIEC) The dipole assisted IEC DaIEC…
p. 38 …in the current experiment. It is found that electron density increases about 17 times more than…
p. 41 …Namely, the time scale for collisional degradation of the beam-like ion distribution function is crucial…
p. 42 …would homogenize the speed within the ion beam a~er some time, making the speed difference…
p. 43 …1) The electrostatic well is deep enough (Eo > 100 kV); 2) Ion confinement time is long…
p. 44 …The source to sink issue noted several times here can be explained as follows. Two opposite…
p. 49 …The time convergence test suggests that employing the largest time step compatible with accuracy in a…
p. 50 …When an ion beam is hot, the waves excited by the instability are ion acoustic type…
p. 51 …used an analytical model of charge- exchange collisions in the IEC plasma to include ion time…
p. 53 …Nevins, Can inertial electrostatic confinement work beyond the ion-ion collisional time scale?" Phys. Plasmas, Vol…
p. 54 …This method uses a pulsed high-energy neutron source and the time-of-flight (TOF) diagnostics…
p. 57 …The longer the charge time, the higher the charge in the energy storage capacitor bank and…
p. 58 …The challenge in these systems is that the unloading time is short and the container is…
p. 59 …by the number of detectors, the detector configuration, the collimated beam size, the acquisition time, and…
p. 62 …The Tokamak has a shorter trip time by employing a power level that is six times…
p. 63 …In this fashion, an array of multiple IECs increase the overall confinement time roughly in proportion…
p. 64 …This recirculation significantly increases the confinement time verses that of a simple cusp devise, leading to…
p. 65 …This re-trapping greatly increases the confinement time of a MCSA fusion device. 58 UNCLASSIFIED/;CEiOAt…
p. 66 …in the IEC high power-to-weight of the MCSA enables fast trip times. The concept…
p. 67 …across the outer surface, so increased confinement times have been achieved by going to the massively…
p. 68 …Here n is the ion density and Tis the ion confinement time. Assuming the converged core…
p. 69 …A specially designed radio frequency (RF) ion gun is installed on the side of the chamber…

UNCLASSIFIED,' fF&II. lilFFll!l*L 1!1!!11!! 911L I
found that there is an optimum voltage in terms of a maximum IEC cathode current.
Ions supplied by the magnetron ion source are essential to maintain the hybrid (glow
and magnetron) discharge under low gas pressure conditions. The reason for this
voltage limit is not clear. Unfortunately this effect limits the cathode voltage despite the
need for high voltage for neutron production near the peak energy of the fusion cross
section. Thus this issue deserves more study to optimize use of a hybrid magnetron
source IEC operation. Still the design worked reasonably well for the initial mine
detection experiments. Unfortunately, the project was terminated prematurely due to
financial constraints, so information on optimization possibility remains incomplete.
The design of the ion source also depends on the ion species being injected. Sources
described thus far have focused on deuterium or, in some cases on tritium. However,
workers at the University of Wisconsin (U. Wisc.) have had a great interest in 3He
reactions (both D- 3He and 3He-3 He), so have developed a gun specialized to 3He ion
production (Reference 2.8). To maximize the ion current, a Helicon source was selected
since Helicons are well known for production of very high density plasmas from which
high ion currents can be extracted. This source is illustrated in Figure 2.6 and discussed
in Reference 2.8. They state that this source has produced steady-state ion currents of
10 mA into IEC systems with background gas pressures as low as 200 μtorr.
Figure 2.6. 3 He Ion Source for Use in 3He- 3He Fusion Rate Studies at the U of Wisconsin
These developments are aimed at observation of the 3He-3 He reaction in an IEC device.
Scoping calculations of beam-background fusion rates predict that a 3 He- 3 He reaction
product spectrum should be distinctly observable in an IEC operating below 200 kV.
19
UNCLASSIFIED/ 1UiOAt OFFIGIPk IP&'i Ollk¥

Not linked to a story yet.

About this file

Report, from the dia collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is under it. 72 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.