The low-power experimental reactor based on fusion technology, ITER, is currently being built in France for scientific experiments. The reactor is expected to be completed by 2027, followed by a test period, after which it is possible to build the DEMO demonstration reactor that is currently in the design stage.
A research group led by materials scientists of the University of Tartu is developing dielectric and diagnostics windows needed for evaluating and monitoring the operation processes of the future DEMO reactor. The project is focused on the development of diamond windows. More precisely, the project aims to find out how the purity of diamond ceramics, various protective layers and other technological innovations affect the radiation resistance of such windows.
University of Tartu researchers’ partners in the three-year project are the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany and the Institute of Solid State Physics, University of Latvia. Researchers in Karlsruhe make the diamond windows, their properties are analysed at the Laboratory of Physics of Ionic Crystals of the University of Tartu, and in Latvia, researchers model how the material would behave under actual operation conditions.
