US academic fusion researchers sound alarm
Toni Feder
Citation: Physics Today 70, 5, 32 (2017); doi: 10.1063/PT.3.3552
View online: http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/PT.3.3552
View Table of Contents: http://physicstoday.scitation.org/toc/pto/70/5
Published by the American Institute of Physics

ISSUES & EVENTSUS academic fusion researchers sound alarm
Forming new modes ofuniversity leadership using
off-campus facilities isessential to sustain the field.

Magnetic confinement fusion research
on US university campuses is incrisis, according to a recent white
paper by the University Fusion Association (UFA). The report focuses on two
worrisome trends: Funding is down, andfaculty members are ge!ing older andshrinking in number. The white paper“gets beyond the anecdotal level to become a statement of the challenges facing
the community collectively,” says UFA
vice president John Sarﬀ of the University of Wisconsin—Madison.
The UFA surveyed the 14 institutions
that between them get roughly 80% of all
funding for university-based fusion andplasma physics provided by the Department of Energy’s Oﬃce of Fusion EnergySciences (FES), the field’s main funder.
At those institutions, the average age offaculty in fusion and plasma research is56, up from 53 a dozen years ago. Some
30% of current faculty were reported
likely to retire in the next five years.
Overall, the survey respondents estimated as poor the likelihood of theirhiring researchers in the field.
The institutions reported receiving
combined experimental fusion fundingof $36.8 million in fiscal year 2015, a 17%
decrease from FY 2006. Nearly twothirds of the money went to the twolargest campus-based facilities—theAlcator C-Mod tokamak at MIT and theMadison Symmetric Torus at the University of Wisconsin. FY 2015 support forother projects was $12.9 million, a 34%
decrease from FY 2006. Over that period,
the total FES budget for universities
remained roughly flat.
Funding for the Alcator C-Mod waszeroed last year, and as of next year thestatus of the Madison Symmetric Torus
within FES will be revised to take a nonfusion focus, and its funding is expected
to go down. For researchers, that leaves
the sma!ering of much smaller oncampus fusion experiments at AuburnUniversity, Columbia University, the Los
Angeles and San Diego campuses of theUniversity of California, and the University of Wisconsin—Madison, plus thelarge national facilities DIII-D at General
Atomics and the National Spherical
Torus Experiment, which is currently
undergoing repairs at the Princeton
Plasma Physics Laboratory. (See Politicsand Policy on PHYSICS TODAY’s website,
29 September 2016.)
The UFA report notes that funding foruniversity researchers to use oﬀ-campus
facilities has gone up, but not by enoughto oﬀset the decrease in funding for oncampus research. Says Dennis Whyte,
director of MIT’s Plasma Science andFusion Center, “You need to be able toCHRIS BOLIN

A GRADUATE STUDENT WORKS ON THE ALCATOR C-MOD TOKAMAK at MIT. The facility lost its funding at the end of last fiscal year. Buton its final day of operation, 30 September 2016, it reached an operating pressure of more than 2 atmospheres, setting a new world record
for magnetically confined plasma.
32 PHYSICS TODAY | MAY 2017

a!ract students, have them work onequipment, prepare equipment. Thenthey sometimes go to an oﬀ-campus
facility. The white paper shows how thebalance has changed. It’s clear that oncampus capabilities have deteriorated.”
Or, as the white paper puts it, “Withouta strong academic foundation our U.S.
fusion program will wither in fundamental respects. . . . We are well intosuch a trend now.”
The white paper’s main recommendations to FES and the fusion community are as follows:• Develop new modes of participation
for university researchers in oﬀcampus facilities that lead to enhanced leadership roles.
• Develop and sustain predictable funding opportunities.
• Develop a long-term vision and strategy for fusion science.
• Promote the long-term strategy ideasand innovations that are best implemented using on-campus experimental facilities.
DOE is “very sensitive” to the concerns expressed in the white paper, says
Edmund Synakowski, the department’s
associate director of science for FES.
“Maintaining a strong fusion research
program at US universities is vital. The
question is not whether to have such astrong program, but how best to maintainthe program’s strength.” But, he says, “wediﬀer with the UFA on the best strategy
to address the two key challenges.”
According to Synakowski, the paradigm for fusion research is shi%ing toward larger collaborations using larger
national and international facilities. “Akey challenge remaining for the university community,” he says, “is how tomake this oﬀ-site leadership activity visible to university departments and administrations, so that fusion can compete
eﬀectively for resources and positions
within the university.”
Whyte points to US participation inITER, the international test fusion reactor under construction in France, as
evidence of US commitment to support
fusion and plasma physics. “ITER obligates us to make sure we have a strong
research eﬀort,” he says. The whitepaper, he continues, “signals deep concern, but we feel it should spark ahealthy dialog.”
Toni Feder PT
MAY 2017 | PHYSICS TODAY 33

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