Annual report 2009 published
3 June 2010
The Annual report 2009 (PDF) has been published. The report contains an overview of events of the last year and a discussion of the most important scientific results. It describes the work of all the groups at the institute and provides data on funding and scientific output in the appendix.
The Rijnhuizen institute celebrated its 50 year anniversary with a special seminar. During the event the anniversary book “Hittebarrière - Vijftig jaar plasmafysica bij FOM-Rijnhuizen” was presented. In 2009, it was decided to split the Fusion Physics department into two parts: (High Temperature) Fusion Physics, lead by the new HRU Tony Donné, and Plasma Surface Interaction, headed by Jürgen Rapp. A number of new staff have been hired to lead newly created groups.
Research programmes
The new FOM research programme FP-120 will investigate the properties of high temperature fusion plasmas, implementing active stabilisation of the plasma with microwaves. The institute received a SenterNovem EOS-NEO grant for research on cheap metal oxide semiconductors for photoconversion, in close collaboration with the Technical University of Delft.
The new IPP called CP3E will investigate the plasma physics and photochemistry in multilayer systems exposed to extreme photon and plasma fluxes as in the final practical application. The programme includes a FOM EUV laboratory within the premises of ASML research. The ITER-NL consortium, in which Rijnhuizen takes part, was awarded support of 8 million euros to continue building a strong contribution of Dutch companies and research to ITER.
Facilities
The new FELICE beam line of the FELIX infrared free electron laser is now operational and interleaved operation with the FELIX beamlines has become routine. The FELICE molecular beam apparatus is fully operational and FELICE's highly sensitive FTICR mass spectrometer will come online in the summer of 2010.
On Magnum-PSI, first plasma was achieved on Magnum-PSI on 18 June 2009, a milestone in the project. Next-geneation plasma sources are being developed on the forerunner experiment Pilot-PSI.
On Friday, July 10th, the permanent Rijnhuizen delegation said goodbye to their colleagues at the Jülich TEXTOR-tokamak. Researchers from Rijnhuizen did experiments at Jülich since the late ‘90s. Future cooperation between the two institutes will continue within the new TEC and will focus on plasma-wall interaction studies with the linear plasma machines Magnum-PSI (Rijnhuizen) and JULE-PSI (Jülich).
Awards and appointments
In 2009, Niek Lopes Cardozo left Rijnhuizen to accept a full-time professorship at Eindhoven University, there to start a new Masters programma en fusion science and technology. Niek was also appointed the new Chairman of the Board of Governors and of the Executive Board of FOM. Jos Oomens was appointed professor of Action Spectroscopy at Amsterdam University. Anouk Rijs received both the Athena and FOm/v fellowships, while one of the EFDA Fusion Fellowships was awarded to post-doctoral researcher Jan Willem Blokland. PhD-student Jonathan Citrin received the Weizmann Institute science prize for his Masters thesis. Finally, Tim Tsarfati won the first FOM Valorisation Chapter award for his PhD thesis and signed on as valorisation officer at FOM Rijnhuizen. He will investigate possible applications of Rijnhuizen’s scientific research.