Au Revoir MAST
Rezwan Razani - September 27, 2013
Today is the last day for the spherical tokamak MAST in England. Don’t panic! “The successor is in preparation with a revolutionary design.”
What’s a MAST
It’s the Mega Ampere Spherical Tokamak or MAST experiment. It is a nuclear fusion experiment in operation at the Culham Centre for Fusion Energy in Culham, Oxfordshire, United Kingdom as of December 1999.
Thanks Rodolphe D’Inca for alerting us.
MAST Transition Tweets
The MAST team in 2011. The next team photo will be on the brand new MAST-Upgrade tokamak – can’t wait! #fusion pic.twitter.com/bK3CYrHJXc
— CCFE Fusion Energy (@fusionenergy) September 27, 2013
MAST has created 24,000 mini ‘stars’ of hot plasma since 1999. It’s taking a well-earned break for a couple of years! pic.twitter.com/cSO5yD8ax1
— CCFE Fusion Energy (@fusionenergy) September 27, 2013
Tokamak #MAST has created its final star before an upgrade. It will return in 18 months more powerful than ever: http://t.co/GzrbYLaFY0
— E&T Magazine (@EandTmagazine) September 27, 2013
What Will the Upgrade Do?
The £30M upgrade of MAST will test new fusion concepts like the Super-X plasma exhaust system. http://t.co/MbFEb1kXYd pic.twitter.com/XnQN7Zo9JR
— CCFE Fusion Energy (@fusionenergy) September 27, 2013
What’s the difference between today’s MAST and the new MAST? Explore here: http://t.co/b24WpmmWwX http://t.co/V7YnBO9hBr #fusion
— CCFE Fusion Energy (@fusionenergy) September 27, 2013
A video
And check out this video uploaded on Oct 30, 2009
High time resolution video of a MAST plasma showing the L-H transition (transition from low to high quality confinement) and ELMs (a form of instability in the plasma).
More Tweets
Who says physicists have no sense of humour? Preparing a lens for MAST’s Thomson scattering diagnostic in 2009. pic.twitter.com/uij1kjcamI
— CCFE Fusion Energy (@fusionenergy) September 27, 2013