An improvement to the global software standard for analyzing fusion plasmas
Friday, April 24, 2015 - 08:40
in Physics & Chemistry
The gold standard for analyzing the behavior of fusion plasmas may have just gotten better. Mario Podestà, a staff physicist at the U.S. Department of Energy's Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL), has updated the worldwide computer program known as TRANSP to better simulate the interaction between energetic particles and instabilities - disturbances in plasma that can halt fusion reactions. The program's updates, reported this week in the journal Nuclear Fusion, could lead to improved capability for predicting the effects of some types of instabilities in future facilities such as ITER, the international experiment under construction in France to demonstrate the feasibility of fusion power.