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Fusion Technology Committee consists of senior members of the fusion
engineering community belonging to organizations that historically
have shown strong support for fusion engineering and for the biennial
Symposium on Fusion Engineering (SOFE). The committee oversees the
symposium and its proceedings as well as the IEEE/NPSS Fusion Technology
awards. A web site is maintained at http://aries.ucsd.edu/PUBLIC/NPSS-FT/
The committee also solicits volunteers for the NPSS Distinguished
Lecture Program. This year we are fortunate to have two distinguished
members of our community available to speak on “Characteristics
of an Economically Attractive Fusion Power Plant” (Prof. Farrokh
Najmabadi, UC San Diego) and “Engineering Challenges for ITER”
(Dr. Brad Nelson, Oak Ridge National Laboratory). Contact Steven
Gold of NRL (steven.gold@nrl.navy.mil)
to schedule a lecture.
The next SOFE – the 23rd – will be located in San Diego
at the Omni hotel on May 31-June 5 of 2009. The 14th, 17th and 20th
SOFE’s also were held in San Diego, but were located on scenic
Mission Bay. The 23rd will be the first to be located in a top-ranked
hotel in the exciting heart of downtown San Diego. More information
on the symposium, which will be collocated with the 36th International
Conference on Plasma Science can be found at http://cer.ucsd.edu/icopssofe09/
A regular event at SOFE is the presentation of the Fusion Technology
award, “To recognize outstanding contributions to research
and development in the field of Fusion Technology”. Nominations
will be sought for this award starting in early 2009. Keep an eye
out for the notice to appear at our web site. Dr. Phil Heitzenroeder
from Princeton Plasma Physics Lab is chair of the awards committee.
Starting in 2007, a Best Student Paper award is also presented at
the Symposia. Generous travel grants will be available for graduate
students who wish to present at SOFE in 2009, so please encourage
any students you know to consider attending.
Another distinction of the 23rd SOFE is the publication for the
first time of a special issue of Transactions on Plasma Science
for selected papers presented at the conference. Only authors who
submit papers to the conference record (the proceedings) will be
invited to submit extended versions for peer review. This new precedent
is an accommodation for those in our community who value peer-reviewed
journal articles, while maintaining the option for our members who
prefer easy and rapid communication in our unrefereed proceedings.
Prof. David Ruzic of the University of Illinois will be the guest
editor for this special issue.
Finally, planning has already started on the 24th Symposium on Fusion
Engineering, to take place at the McCormick Place convention center
in Chicago IL June 26-30, 2011 together with the 38th ICOPS. Dr.
Charles Neumeyer from Princeton Plasma Physics Lab will be the general
chair. Please mark your calendar.
Mark Tillack, Chair of the Fusion Technical Committee, can be
reached at University of California, San Diego, 458A EBU-II, 9500
Gilman Drive, MC 0417, La Jolla, CA 92093-0417; Phone: +1 858 534
7897; Fax: +1 858 822 2120; E-mail: mtillack@ucsd.edu.
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