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Defense Intelligence Reference Document Inertial Electrostatic Confinement Fusion

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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.

  • p. 5 …Photo of Center Spot Formation ......................................................... 12 Figure 2.1. The "Historic" Early IEC Ion Injection Experiment…
  • p. 9 …The ideal, however, is the elimination of the grid altogether which can be done via formation…
  • p. 12 …This result was quite negative for electron formation of potential wells, but left the route possibly…
  • p. 14 …most critical factors which inhibit deep well formation are inadequate spherical focusing and charge neutralization. The…
  • p. 18 …The ion formation is done in the high pressure gun discharge region outside of the chamber…
  • p. 19 …Photo of Center Spot Formation. The main beam observed is a direct path along the injector…
  • p. 20 …Klevans, "Theory of Potential-Well Formation in an Electrostatic Confinement Device", J. of Appl. Phys., Vol…
  • p. 22 …As shown in the paper, he found structure for both consistent with well formation. One possible…
  • p. 30 …However, to date, formation of the jet has only been studied under steady-state operation. 23…
  • p. 31 …The result is the formation of the intense space charge neutralized ion beam (or "plasma jet…
  • p. 32 …This type of ion formation in the IEC has been studied extensively by workers at Nambe…
  • p. 35 …The approach being pursued at UIUC is the formation of deep potential wells with angular ion…
  • p. 45 …considered well formation with emphasis on angular momentum effects (Reference 4.4). Earlier studies had assumed…
  • p. 48 …is very encouraging for formation of deep wells in IEC devices designed for reactors using beam…
  • p. 49 …Krylov algorithm that does not require actual formation and storage of the Jacobian matrix to minimize…
  • p. 69 …While very demanding, plasma simulations show that carefully controlled injection can provide the potential well formation…
  • p. 70 …This eliminates the need for a grid by formation of a deep potential well (ion trap…
REFERENCES
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4.1 W.M. Nevins, Can inertial electrostatic confinement work beyond the ion-ion
collisional time scale?" Phys. Plasmas, Vol. 2, No. IO, October (1995) pp. 3804-3819.
4.2 L. Chacon, G. H. Miley, D. C. Barnes, and D. A. Knoll, "Energy gain calculations
in Penning fusion systems using a bounce-averaged Fokker-Planck modelz" Phys. of
Plasmas, vol. 7, no. 11, (2000) p. 4547.
4.3 T .N. Tiouririne and D. C. Barnes, Optimization of SCIF Fusion Systems", Bull.
Am. Phys. Soc., vol. 40 (1995) pp. 1665.
4.4 I.V. Tzonev, J. M. DeMora, G.H. Miley, "Effect of Large Ion Angular Momentum
Spread and High Current on Inertial Electrostatic Confinement Potential Structures",
Proc. 16th IEEENPSS Symp. Dn Fusion Engr. (Miley and Elliott, eds.) IEEE paper
95CH35852, 1476-1481 (1996).
4.5 G.H. Miley and H. Momota, "Virtual Cathode in a Stationary Spherical Inertial
Electrostatic Confinement", Fusion Science and Technology, Vol. 40, July (2001).
4.6 H.J. Kim, "Instability Studies on a Spherical Inertial Electrostatic Confinement",
Dissertation, Submitted in partial fulfillment for the requirements of degree of Doctor of
Philosophy, NPRE Department, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Illinois
(2006).
4.7 T.H. Rider, "A general critique of inertial-electrostatic confinement fusion
systems", Phys. Plasmas, Vol. 2, No. 6, June (1995) p. 1853.
4.8 G.H. Miley, John M. DeMora, Brian E. Jurczyk, Martin Nieto, "Computational
Studies of Collisional Processes in Inertial Electrostatic Glow Discharge Fusion Devices,"
18th Symposium on Fusion Engineering, (1999) p 23.
Section V. Potential Applications
The ultimate application for IECs is for electrical power production. This is discussed
further in Section VI. Section V concentrates on various near-term "spin off"
applications of neutron/proton/x-ray sources and also non-electrical power applications
such as space propulsion.
NEUTRON/PROTON/XRAY SOURCES
As seen from the discussion to this point, the main application of the IEC to date has
been as a small portable neutron source for NAA. In addition, since both D-D and D- 3He
reactions can be used for proton production, IECs have also been pursed for medial
isotope and PET scan isotope production. However, due to the need for high source
strengths to fully compete in this arena, that use is still undergoing research. Another
novel application noted earlier is the use of the IEC to simulate implantation of D+ and
He+ in candidate fusion reactor first wall materials. Yet another novel use involves
running the IEC with reverse polarity such that the trapped electrons produce soft x-
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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.