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Colin Judge: Testing structural materials in Idaho’s newest hot cell facility
Idaho National Laboratory’s newest facility—the Sample Preparation Laboratory (SPL)—sits across the road from the Hot Fuel Examination Facility (HFEF), which started operating in 1975. SPL will host the first new hot cells at INL’s Materials and Fuels Complex (MFC) in 50 years, giving INL researchers and partners new flexibility to test the structural properties of irradiated materials fresh from the Advanced Test Reactor (ATR) or from a partner’s facility.
Materials meant to withstand extreme conditions in fission or fusion power plants must be tested under similar conditions and pushed past their breaking points so performance and limitations can be understood and improved. Once irradiated, materials samples can be cut down to size in SPL and packaged for testing in other facilities at INL or other national laboratories, commercial labs, or universities. But they can also be subjected to extreme thermal or corrosive conditions and mechanical testing right in SPL, explains Colin Judge, who, as INL’s division director for nuclear materials performance, oversees SPL and other facilities at the MFC.
SPL won’t go “hot” until January 2026, but Judge spoke with NN staff writer Susan Gallier about its capabilities as his team was moving instruments into the new facility.
S. G. Cho, T. Lho, H. G. Choi, M.-K. Bae, I. J. Kang, D. H. Lee, S. K. Joo, K.-S. Chung
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 68 | Number 1 | July 2015 | Pages 157-160
Technical Note | Open Magnetic Systems 2014 | doi.org/10.13182/FST14-876
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
We investigated charged dust and its effect on RF plasma by using a planar electric probe in a large-scale device. In background plasmas, the particle density is 108 to 109 cm−3 and the electron temperature is 2 to 4 eV. When dust is contained in plasma, it is negatively charged by electrons attached to the dust. The charged dust density and the charge were calculated by comparing dusty helium plasma to pure helium plasma. Depending on the increase in the amount of dust, the charged dust density increases with the decrease in the charge due to depletion of the electrons in the background plasma. The results show that the charge changes the interactions between the dust and particles in the background plasma.
