A study on smoothed particle hydrodynamics for liquid metal flow simulation

Abstract

In order to address the problem of heat and particle removal in tokamak-type, magnetic confinement nuclear fusion reactors, a divertor that utilizes liquid metal is suggested to replace solid tungsten divertors due to concerns regarding their structural integrity at high energy fluxes. The operation of such a device gives rise to phenomena spanning multiple disciplines of physics such as fluid dynamics, electromagnetics, thermodynamics and plasma physics. Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) is a Lagrangian, mesh-free numerical method that has been proven effective in a variety of disciplines. In this work, the hydrodynamic aspect of the liquid metal divertor is simulated using SPH, paving the way to implement additional physics in future work.