Measuring the radiation field and radiation hard detectors at JET: Recent developments

Since in ITER the radiation field will be much more demanding than that of present day devices, research programmes at JET are aimed at developing radiation hard diagnostics and related components. Initially, significant efforts are devoted to determining the radiation field of both the plasma and in the immediate environment with better accuracy. New developments in MCNP calculations and dedicated measurements provide useful information about the radiation field in the Torus Hall, even during non-operational periods. The effect of using Beryllium in the near future for JET first wall, is being assessed. New materials for activation samples are under consideration and will be tested to improve the calibration accuracy of JET neutron diagnostics. The long-term goal of this work is to obtain spectrometric information from an appropriate combination of different materials. Several studies are under way to modify the radiation field at the detectors by using LiH or pure water as neutron filters, to alleviate the problem of the background in gamma-ray measurements. A suite of radiation hard detectors for neutrons, magnetic field and charged particles are being developed. Super-heated fluid neutron detectors, used for yield and imaging, are being upgraded, in order to provide a broadband spectrometric capability. Chemical vapour deposited diamond diodes are being qualified as counters and as spectrometers. Prototypes of Hall probes made of InSb have been installed on the machine and have provided some preliminary results. Si-on-insulator detectors are under development for use in neutral particle analysers and are currently being bench-tested. Some attention is being devoted to optical components, fibres and mirrors, and to investigating radiation hard electronics using reconfigurable Field Programmable Gate Arrays. (C) 2008 Published by Elsevier B.V.