Abstract
The group of 25 articles published in this special issue of Nuclear Fusion aims to monitor the progress made with experiments on fusion physics that have been conducted worldwide up to the end of 2004. These articles are based on overview reports from the various experimental teams presented at the Fusion Energy Conference (FEC 2004). This conference was organized by the IAEA together with the Portuguese host organization CFN-IST and was held in Vilamoura, Portugal, in early November 2004. The overviews presented at the conference have been rewritten and extended for the purpose of this special issue and submitted to the standard double-referee peer-review of Nuclear Fusion. Most teams have made use of this opportunity. Therefore this issue, which also includes four conference summaries, presents a reasonably complete picture of the progress made since FEC 2002 in Lyon.
The articles are placed in the following sequence:
Conference summaries
Theory of magnetic confinement
Experimental confinement, plasma-material interactions and innovative concepts
Experiments on stability, energetic particles, waves and current drive
Inertial confinement fusion
Tokamaks
Performance: JT-60U, JET, DIII-D, ASDEX-U, C-MOD
Steady state/long pulse operation: Tore Supra, HT-7, TRIAM
Spherical tokamaks: MAST, NSTX
Tritium experiments: JET
Diagnostics and heating methods: JET (diagnostics), T-10 (ECRH and diagnostics) and FTU (LHH + ECRH)
New devices: HL-2A
Small devices
Alternative magnetic confinement concepts
Stellarators: LHD, TJ-II
Reversed field pinches: MST
Inertial confinement
Direct drive
Heavy ion beam fusion
Readers will also notice the supplementary issue of the journal (volume 45, issue 10A). This extra issue contains the 15-year overview report on progress in fusion research as written by the International Fusion Research Council (IFRC) under the editorial responsibility of the IFRC. Both issues together will give the interested reader a state-of-the-art picture of the progress in nuclear fusion research.