FUSENET sponsors the Karlsruhe International School on Fusion Technologies, in Germany. One of the students present, Teofil Minea, reports:

Almost a week has passed since the Karlsruhe summer school on fusion technology has started and I can definitely say that I enjoy the time spent here. A typical day consists lectures from 9 to 5 and presentations from specialists in various fields related to Fusion.

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To get a glimpse of what has happened so far, check this schedule:

http://summerschool.fusion.kit.edu/downloads/Programme_Summerschool_2012.pdf

As you can see there isn’t any topic in the fusion field left untouched. This is an optimistic and bold approach for only two weeks of school, but people have tried their best in the approximately 1.5 hours they had for each lecture. Having covered most of the physics during the first year of courses in Eindhoven, made this first week a very nice review and refreshed my knowledge about Fusion Plasma Physics and tokamak behavior. It also added some interesting aspects on technological aspects such as tritium handling and vacuum systems.

Apart from that we had two on-site visits on a tritium handling facility and material testing as well. The complexity of the tritium handling facility is so great that the people who have started it approx. twenty years ago are still operating it, being the only ones who fully know all commands.

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The weekend provides a well-deserved break, having the Saturday free for travelling while on Sunday a trip is planned to a city nearby called Speyer where among other activities a wine tasting is planned.

I close here my short report of the first week with the promise of a final one at the end of the summer school event.