* - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - *
|
*       U N I V E R S I T Y  F U S I O N  A S S O C I A T I O N
|
*       News and Information                    Sep 29, 2003
|
* - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - *
        website:        http://depts.washington.edu/ufa/home.html


CONTENTS:

        1. NRC Burning Plasma Assessment Committee Report Released
        2. UFA Survey of Fusion Demographics


// ---------------------------------------------------------------------- //
        1. NRC Burning Plasma Assessment Committee Report Released
// ---------------------------------------------------------------------- //

The NRC's Burning Plasma Assessment Committee has released the unedited
prepublication draft of its final report.

http://www7.nationalacademies.org/bpa/BPAC_Draft_Prepub.pdf

The Burning Plasma Assessment Committee was established in July 2002 at
the request of the DOE's Office of Science.  The committee was charged
with assessing the importance of a burning plasma experimental program,
the scientific and technical readiness to undertake a burning plasma
experimental program, and the plan for the U.S. magnetic fusion burning
plasma experimental program.

Below is the accompanying press summary.


Press Summary
=============
                  To increase its efforts in nuclear fusion a potential
source of nearly inexhaustible energy, - the U.S. Department of Energy
(DOE) should participate in an international projectthe International
Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER)to build a fusion facility called
a burning plasma experiment, states the report from the National Academies
National Research Council. In reaffirming its recommendation to join ITER
from an earlier, interim report, the committee also recommended that DOE
should at the same time strengthen its domestic fusion research program.

                  Participation in ITER and work on the burning plasma
experiment at home are critical missing elements in the U.S. fusion
program, said committee co-chair Raymond J. Fonck, professor of nuclear
engineering and engineering physics at the University of Wisconsin,
Madison. Our country has made remarkable progress in fusion research in
recent years and is now ready to take the next critical step that would
position us as a leader in this field.

                  Fusion - the nuclear reaction that powers the starscan
occur when a confined gas of hydrogen and deuterium is heated to the point
where it becomes a very hot plasma: a mixture of fast-moving nuclei and
electrons. When fusion takes place in this plasma, energy is produced. If
the internally-generated energy is large enough to sustain the reaction,
the result is burning plasma. Although it has not yet been produced yet on
Earth, a burning plasma is the primary goal of current efforts to produce
energy through nuclear fusion.

                  The ITER project, which is expected to create a burning
plasma, was initiated in 1988 by four partnersthe United States, Japan,
the European Union, and Russia (then the Soviet Union). The U.S.
withdrew 10 years later amid cost concerns. But in the past year, the Bush
administration has announced its willingness to rejoin ITER, and the House
and Senate have affirmed this action. The current members of the
projectRussia, Canada, Japan, and the European Unionare now negotiating
the future site of ITER.

                  While the committee found that ITER was the most mature
and promising design for a burning plasma experiment, it also recommended
that if negotiations to join ITER fail, DOE should continue to pursue the
goal of conducting such an experiment with international partners.
Regardless of which path is selected, the committee recommended that once
the project begins, DOE should re-examine its domestic program in
re-establish research priorities in the context of the burning plasma
experiment.

                  DOE officials should map out a multiyear strategic plan
that includes a balanced portfolio of theoretical and experimental
research that could be conducted in parallel with ITER, the report says.
Also, participation in ITER would require DOE to increase its fusion
research budget, which has remained flat in recent years, the report says.

                  If the U.S. participates in ITER, a stagnant budget for
DOEs Office of Fusion Energy Sciences will inevitably lead to decay in
facilities and fewer research opportunities, said committee co-chair John
F.  Ahearne, director of the ethics program at the Sigma Xi Center in
Research Triangle Park, N.C and a lecturer at Duke University. Reducing
critical U.S. fusion activities will increase the risk of our country
playing a secondaryinstead of a leadingrole in ITER.

                  A funding plan that avoids these risks by prioritizing
opportunities for fusion research should be prepared by DOEs Office of
Fusion Energy Sciences, the report says. For instance, fusion scientists
should identify and prioritize the critical questions to address in
extended research campaigns, as is done for other scientific areas such as
high-energy physics.




// ---------------------------------------------------------------------- //
        2. UFA Survey of Fusion Demographics
// ---------------------------------------------------------------------- //

The UFA Executive Committee completed a report on demographics of fusion
science faculty in the US.  "A Report on the Age Distribution of Fusion
Science Faculty and Fusion Science PhD Production in the United States",
E. Scime, K. Gentle, A. Hassam, University Fusion Association, July 2003,
can be found at http://depts.washington.edu/ufa/download.html

The Executive Summary is attached below.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

A survey of the demographics of fusion science faculty at US universities
is reported.  An assessment of production rate of PhD's in fusion science
is also included.

The age distribution of fusion science faculty (including both engineering
and physics faculty) at universities shows a marked imbalance weighted
towards older faculty.  In contrast, the age distribution for all physics
faculty is fairly flat.  As one measure, the ratio of faculty in the 55-75
age bracket to faculty in the 30-50 age bracket ("skewness ratio") is 1.5
for the fusion science faculty and 1.1 for all physics faculty.  This
aging of fusion science faculty is more pronounced when only larger (more
than five fusion faculty) institutions are considered (MIT, U. Maryland,
U. Wisconsin, U. Texas, UCLA, and UCSD).  For this grouping, the skewness
ratio is about 2.4.  The skewness ratio for physics faculty doing fusion
science at the "Top 25 in Physics" universities (as defined by USNews) is
about 7.

Hiring trends at the above larger institutions suggest that recent and
projected fusion science hiring at larger institutions is down: in the
last ten years, only 10% of all Assistant Prof. hires at these
institutions were in plasma science; and, based on self-reported
departmental strategic plans, the hoped-for hiring in fusion science over
the next five years indicates a hiring-to-retirement ratio of at most two
hires for every three retirements.

The production rate of PhD's in plasma and fusion science shows a steady
decline starting 1986.  This decline starts approximately 3 years after
the onset of a similar steady decline in the funding level of the US
Fusion Energy Sciences Program.