Isotopic, Doped Diamond Materials as a Plasma-facing Material for Fusion Power

Diamond is an attractive material for use as a shielding material in fusion reactors due to its exceptional radiation harness, thermal conductivity and low sputtering yield. However, its main disadvantage is the high level of tritium retention which subsequently leads to its degradation and graphitisation and a consequential loss in shielding performance and stability. Also, retention could lead to much higher tritium inventory in fusion power stations which is undesirable for safety and other reasons.
Funded jointly by the EPSRC and the UKAEA-CCFE, this research project seeks to evaluate the performance of diamond materials synthesised from Carbon 13/Carbon 12 composites with varying levels of dopant impurities, to be used as a wall material in tokamak fusion reactors.
Experimental work will be carried out both at the Bristol as a member of the Diamond Group in the School of Chemistry, and on the MAST Upgrade tokamak at UKAEA Culham, as a member of the Experiments Department. It is expected that the student will spend at up to 50% of their time conducting experimental work based at Culham.
The PhD project will involve training in the use of Chemical Vapour Deposition equipment for diamond growth of semiconducting composite materials and their characterisation using state of the art equipment, such as the Bristol NanoESCA. The implantation and characterisation equipment in the Materials Research Facility at Culham will also be available to examine the material pre- and post-exposure. The student will also be expected to conduct some computational work to support the experimental activities at Culham.