G. Meisl

Implantation and erosion of nitrogen in tungsten

Nitrogen puffing is routinely applied in nuclear fusion plasma experiments with tungsten walls to control the amount of power emitted from the plasma by radiation. However, as nitrogen is retained in significant amounts in tungsten it adds some complexity to the plasma-wall interaction. Basic questions concerning the interaction of nitrogen with tungsten, namely the energy and temperature dependent retention of nitrogen implanted into tungsten and the erosion of the formed tungsten nitride by deuterium, are still open. To address these questions, laboratory experiments with a mass-filtered ion source and sample analysis with in situ x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and nuclear reaction analysis were performed. The results of the implantation and erosion measurements were interpreted by means of simulations with a Monte-Carlo code describing the interaction of energetic particles with matter in the binary collision approximation. This required the development of a forward calculation, converting the simulated depth profiles into XPS intensity ratios. With appropriate settings, the experimental implantation and erosion results at ambient temperature are well described by the simulations. However, for increased temperatures it has been observed that there is an unexpected difference between implanting nitrogen into tungsten before heating the sample and implantation into a heated sample. The application of the developed forward calculation is not limited to the problems presented in this work but can be applied especially to all kind of XPS sputter-depth profiling measurements. Finally, simulations with the previously validated Monte-Carlo code are used to extrapolate the presented results on nitrogen retention to energies and particle compositions relevant for fusion experiments. These simulations make quantitative predictions on nitrogen retention in tungsten and on relevant time scales. The simulations also show that recoil implantation of nitrogen by deuterium significantly increases the effective implantation depth of nitrogen.

WALLDYN simulations of global impurity migration in JET and extrapolations to ITER

The migration of first wall material due to erosion, plasma transport and re-deposition is one of the key challenges in current and future fusion devices. To predict erosion/re-deposition patterns and to understand the underlying principal processes, the global simulation code WallDYN was developed. It couples the evolution of the first wall surface composition to plasma impurity transport. To benchmark the WallDYN model, it was applied to the JET ITER-like wall experiment (JET-ILW), which mimics the ITER first wall material configuration and is thus an ideal environment to validate the predictive significance of WallDYN calculations for ITER application. The WallDYN calculations show good agreement with the Be deposition patterns determined from JET-ILW post-campaign wall tile analysis. The WallDYN results on W erosion and deposition also qualitatively match the post mortem patterns but quantitatively fall short by a factor of 20 which can be consolidated by including the influence of ELMs on the W erosion source. Applying the same model and process physics as for the JET calculations, the impurity migration and resulting fuel species co-deposition in ITER for different wall configurations and background plasmas were calculated. The simulations show that C containing wall configurations lead to unacceptable T retention whereas for the current ITER material choice (Be wall and W divertor) co-deposition will not limit the ITER operation. However the erosion of W by self-sputtering even without the contribution of ELMs could hamper ITER operation under certain plasma scenarios.

Interaction of Deuterium Plasma with Sputter-deposited Tungsten Nitride Films

Magnetron-sputtered tungsten nitride (WNx) films were used as a model system to study the behaviour of re-deposited WNx layers which could form in fusion devices with tungsten (W) wall during nitrogen seeding. The interaction of such WNx layers with deuterium (D) plasmas was investigated in dedicated laboratory experiments. D retention and N removal due to D plasma exposure (D flux: 9.9 × 1019 D m−2 s−1, ion energy 215 eV) at different temperatures were measured with ion beam analysis (IBA). Low-energy argon sputtering followed by IBA was applied to resolve the D distribution in the top-most surface of WNx with significantly improved depth resolution compared with the standard D depth profiling method by nuclear reaction analysis. Experimentally determined thicknesses for the penetration of D in WNx were compared with the penetration depth for D calculated in SDTrimSP simulations. Results show that D is only retained within the ion penetration range for samples exposed at 300 K. In contrast to the 300 K case, D diffuses beyond the implantation depth in a sample exposed at 600 K. However, the D penetration depth is much lower than in pure W at comparable conditions. The total amount of retained D in WNx at 600 K is by 50% lower than for implantation at 300 K with the same D fluence. Nitrogen is removed only within the D ion range.

Nitrogen retention mechanisms in tokamaks with beryllium and tungsten plasma-facing surfaces

Global gas balance experiments at ASDEX Upgrade (AUG) and JET have shown that a considerable fraction of nitrogen injected for radiative cooling is not recovered as N-2 upon regeneration of the liq ...

Experimental analysis and WallDYN simulations of the global nitrogen migration in ASDEX Upgrade L-mode discharges

This work presents ASDEX Upgrade experiments, where the nitrogen deposition and re-erosion on divertor manipulator samples and the effect of its transport through the plasma were studied. These results are compared to WallDYN-DIVIMP simulations based on SOLPS plasma backgrounds and employing an improved WallDYN model, which includes the effusion of nitrogen from saturated surfaces. On one hand, this allows the WallDYN code and the new saturation model with a comprehensive data set to be benchmarked, on the other hand the simulations help in the interpretation of the experimental results. Both, experimental results and simulations, show that the N content in the region of the outer strike line reaches its steady-state value within one discharge. The simulations also reproduce the experimentally observed nitrogen content in samples exposed to N2-seeded discharges. With respect to the boron deposition, the nitrogen deposition in a non-seeded discharge and the re-erosion of nitrogen discrepancies to the WallDYN-DIVIMP simulations are observed. Based on SDTrimSP simulations, these are attributed to the missing depth resolution of the WallDYN surface model. A detailed comparison of spectroscopic measurements to WallDYN simulations, based on a novel synthetic spectroscopy diagnostic for WallDYN, shows that the nitrogen fluxes in the plasma are well described by the simulations. From a comparison of several WallDYN-DIVIMP simulations employing customized onion-skin model plasma backgrounds the physical processes controlling the nitrogen concentration in the core plasma and the applicability of onion-skin model plasma backgrounds are discussed. From these simulations the private flux zone with the gas valve, the outer baffle and the high field side main wall are identified as the main sources for the nitrogen content of the core plasma.

Simulating the nitrogen migration in Be/W tokamaks with WallDYN

The migration of wall material or seeding impurities plays an important role in the formation of mixed materials, the impurity contamination of the plasma and tritium retention. First, this work pr ...

Nitrogen implantation in tungsten and migration in the fusion experiment ASDEX Upgrade

The implantation of nitrogen ions into tungsten was studied in laboratory experiments to understand the interaction of nitrogen containing fusion plasmas with tungsten walls. The resulting model of W-N interaction was tested by experiments in the tokamak ASDEX Upgrade. Using the measurements from these experiments as boundary condition, nitrogen transport and re-distribution in the plasma were modeled by self-consistent WallDYN-DIVIMP simulations.