Des millions de points de données pour un levage réussi

Matthew Hole—plasma physics expert at the Australian National University and ITER Scientist Fellow—recently developed a mathematical model to solve a problem confronting ITER engineers.

ITER will have roughly 500 magnetic sensors embedded in and around the plasma-facing first wall. During manufacturing, installation, connecting, and commissioning, there is a risk that sensor channels may be swapped, a cable may be mislabelled, or the polarity of a sensor may be reversed. Although the locations of the magnetic sensors are known, ITER teams must still verify that each recorded data channel corresponds to the correct sensor and polarity after installation and connection of hundreds of cables.

This labelling of 500 sensors was an extremely labour-intensive task. “I wanted to find a way to do it faster,” says Hole.

During his three-month fellowship at ITER, Hole combined mathematics, physics, and computing to model the magnetic-field response of every coil and frame the puzzle as a mathematical search problem. AI-assisted coding tools identified the class of problem and suggested an unexpected technique called the Hungarian optimisation algorithm. 

This enabled Hole to program a model delivering the coil positions and orientations in a tiny fraction of the previously allocated time. His model is also replicable, meaning ITER engineers can rerun it if a coil ever becomes misaligned.

“AI can’t replace the scientist’s curiosity or intuition,” says Matthew, “but it can explore scientific threads much more quickly. It’s like having tireless expert companions, across all fields, always available that can help you advance more rapidly.”

The work is described in an article published by the Australian National University and in a newly published scientific paper.

WEST has concluded its three-month C13 campaign with a milestone: producing its first H-mode plasmas with Edge Localized Modes (ELMs). 

H-mode is the high-confinement regime that ITER will use to achieve several of its research goals, and it is characterized by ELMs—bursts of energy and particles released at the plasma edge that deposit extreme thermal loads on plasma-facing components.

Achieving this regime on WEST provides a unique opportunity to investigate plasma-wall interactions closer to foreseen ITER conditions and opens the route to one of the pillars of the WEST scientific program: testing the ITER divertor components against transient heat fluxes during long time periods and in a similar tungsten environment. 

Beyond plasma performance, the C13 campaign yielded operational insights like the minimum wall boronization needed to restart after a venting, the use of ion cyclotron resonance heating (ICRH) for wall conditioning between pulses, and the use of ICRH for boronization. 

These results will contribute to the preparation of ITER-relevant plasma scenarios, the development of predictive models, and the validation of the ITER divertor’s performance.

Read more about WEST’s C13 campaign here.

The ITER Organization and the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Institute of Plasma Physics (ASIPP) are launching a joint postdoctoral training program. 

ASIPP will employ early-career researchers, who will be jointly supervised by experts from both institutions. The two-year positions will focus on topics of shared interests and involve conducting research at both ITER and ASIPP headquarters.

Applications are now open to candidates from China and other ITER Member countries. Read ITER’s announcement or visit the ASIPP webpage for further details about the program and its application process.

The 16th ITER International School on the topic of "Tokamaks as Fusion Reactors" will be held from 30 November 2026 to 4 December 2026. The school is jointly organized by Institute for Plasma Research (IPR), Bhat, Gandhinagar, Gujarat, and The International Center for Theoretical Sciences – Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (ICTS-TIFR), Bengaluru, in collaboration with ITER Organization and Aix Marseille University, France. The school will be hosted at ICTS-TIFR, Bengaluru. 

The ITER International School aims to prepare young scientists and engineers for working in the field of nuclear fusion and in research applications associated with the ITER project. The 16th edition will cover a broad range of topics related to tokamak fusion reactors’ physics and technologies, such as plasma confinement, heat and particle exhaust, integrated control and operation, integrated modelling and digital twins, plasma-materials interaction, superconducting magnets technology, neutron shielding, and tritium breeding. 

Registration is open from 25 July to 23 August. For all information see this website.