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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.
E. Westerhof, J. A. Hoekzema, G. M. D. Hogeweij, R. J. E. Jaspers, F. C. Schüller, C. J. Barth, H. Bindslev, W. A. Bongers, A. J. H. Donné, P. Dumortier, A. F. van der Grift, D. Kalupin, H. R. Koslowski, A. Krämer-Flecken, O. G. Kruijt, N. J. Lopes Cardozo, H. J. van der Meiden, A. Merkulov, A. Messiaen, J. W. Oosterbeek, P. R. Prins, J. Scholten, V. S. Udintsev, B. Unterberg, M. Vervier, G. van Wassenhove
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 47 | Number 2 | February 2005 | Pages 108-118
Technical Paper | TEXTOR: A Flexible Device | doi.org/10.13182/FST05-A692
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
TEXTOR is equipped with two gyrotrons at 110 and 140 GHz, respectively. Both share a single power supply and a confocal quasi-optical transmission line. They cannot be operated simultaneously. The 110-GHz gyrotron with limited power and pulse length (300 kW; 200 ms) has been used in a first series of experiments on electron cyclotron resonance heating (ECRH) and electron cyclotron current drive (ECCD) and for collective Thomson scattering (CTS) diagnostics of energetic ions. In the future the 110-GHz gyrotron will be operated exclusively for CTS diagnostics, while for ECRH and ECCD, the newly installed 140-GHz, high-power (800-kW), long-pulse (>3-s) gyrotron is now available. The highlights of first ECRH experiments with the 110-GHz gyrotron are reported. These include observations of internal transport barriers with ECRH on various target plasmas: in the current plateau phase of both ohmic and radiation improved mode (RI-mode) discharges. In addition, sawtooth control by localized ECRH is demonstrated. First results on CTS include the observation of the slowing down of energetic ions and of the redistribution of energetic ions in sawtooth crashes.
