News and events
MAST update - Autumn 2009 | 28/10/2009
MAST status
At the end of the summer a short MAST engineering break was completed on schedule and a plasma was established on 2 September. During the engineering break, the new Thomson scattering collection lens (pictured right) was installed and essential maintenance was carried out on the MAST centre column and toroidal field sliding joints. The Thomson scattering system installation represents the second and final stage of a major £2 million upgrade, part-funded by York University. The new system was calibrated on 6-7 September and high temporal and spatial resolution profiles of electron temperature and density are now available. This major project is on schedule and close to budget – a major achievement.
In parallel with these activities, the 28GHz gyrotron, on loan from Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has been commissioned to high power into a calorimeter and electron Bernstein wave start up experiments, exploiting the gyrotron, have started. These experiments are being carried out as part of an EU-US-JA collaboration. The two MAST neutral beam injectors are presently being commissioned and experiments with high power NBI will resume in early October.
The present experimental campaign (M7c) will run until 18 December and will also benefit from the availability of a new fast gas valve (on loan from FZJ Julich). Detailed plans are being prepared for the next major MAST engineering break which will begin at Christmas and last approximately five months.
MAST Research Forum
The 6th MAST Research Forum took place at Culham on 14-15 September to review results from 2008/09 (campaigns M7a, M7b), prioritise experiments for campaign M7c (Autumn 2009) and consider the main aims and objectives for campaign M8 (2010). Many international collaborators and UK university scientists attended the forum or participated remotely by video conference.
Visits to MAST
Several scientists from the USA and Japan visited MAST in September to participate in the EBW start-up experiments and to assist with gyrotron commissioning.
Conferences and meetings
MAST was very well represented at the EFDA Transport Topical Group Meeting at Culham in September. Presentations were made by Andrew Kirk, Patrick Tamain, Hendrik Meyer, Anthony Field and Clive Michael.
Simon Pinches attended the 11th IAEA Technical Meeting on Energetic Particles in Kiev where he gave a presentation on fast ion driven instabilities in MAST. He also attended the ITPA Topical Group meeting on energetic particles which was held in conjunction with the IAEA meeting.
