Fabrication fo Reliable Tungsten Brush Structures for Fusion Reactor Applications

199 Fabrication for Reliable Tungsten Brush Structures for Fusion Reactor Applications--Surmet Corporation, 33 B Street, , Burlington, MA 01803-3406; (617) 272-3250 Dr. Suri A. Sastri, Principal Investigator Dr. Suri A. Sastri, Business Official DOE Grant No. DE-FG02-97ER82488 Amount: $75,000 The high heat and neutron flux faced by the plasma facing components in a fusion reactor necessitates active cooling. Tungsten, beryllium and carbon-carbon composites have been identified as leading contenders in the choice for plasma facing components. There is urgent need for a method of bonding the plasma facing armor to the cooling structure that provides high thermal conductivity through the bond on a highly reliable basis. In this Phase I project, the technical feasibility of an innovative low temperature technique to fabricate a superior tungsten brush tile structure with the bundled tungsten rods embedded into, and bonded onto, a copper base material will be demonstrated. The concept of the brush is to reduce the thermal strain mismatch and avoid stress -singularity found at the edge of the interface with a flat tile design. Elegant as these design concepts are, their practical usefulness has to be born out by actually fabricating and testing an ITER-compatible plasma facing component brush structure. Commercial Applications and Other Benefits as described by the awardee: The ability to successfully fabricate at relatively low temperatures, structures incorporating tungsten will be a significant development. A major area of emerging applications for this technology could be in the electronic packaging for CTE matching and thermo mechanical stress management as well as in Aero space and military applications. While the X-Ray anode application currently appears to have adequate technology, availability of better techniques would allow novel designs and capabilities not possible before.