AAWSAP DIRD, Inertial Electrostatic Confinement Fusion, March 2010

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~1016 cm-3, ion trap times of~ 1 sec are required. While very demanding, plasma
simulations show that carefully controlled injection can provide the potential well
formation (trap) required to achieve this goal.
PROPOSED BREAKEVEN EXPERIMENT
Studies of gridded configurations discussed earlier have achieved reaction rates of up to
1012 reactions per second(~ 1 Watt of fusion power) . Although these power levels fall
well below the requisite "break even" condition for power production, corresponding
neutrons production makes the IEC an excellent compact source for practical NAA.
Consequently this application and then related "spin -off" type projects have continued
to advance IEC basic physics understanding to the point where a pathway to a power
reactor can now be envisioned. Present IEC experiments at UIUC are designed to
baseline Q impact of ion injection conditions combined with supplemental electron
sources to maintain the desired quasi-neutrality. One of the current experiments,
shown in Figure 6.2, consists of a 16-inch diam. spherical vacuum system with a
spherical grid held at a high potential. This system produces about 108 reactions/sec
based on neutron counting experiments. A specially designed radio frequency (RF) ion
gun is installed on the side of the chamber to study controlled ion injection and
corresponding potential well formation for ion trapping.
Spherical f(v)
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IEC well depth ( kV )
Figure 6.1. p-11B Fusion Cross Section Energy Requirements. The p-ll B reaction rate
approaches that of D-T at very high energies, I.e. deep potential wells.
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