which grad school spec for fusion research

torquemada

is nuclear physics or plasma physics a better grad concentration for current/future fusion research? thx

nuclear85

If you really mean nuclear physics, not that. If you mean nuclear engineering, you could go either way. There are lots of engineering and materials issues with fusion, while plasma physics is perhaps the more direct path, but more limiting if you're unable to find funding in fusion research. It really depends on what you're interested in. If you don't like EM, don't do plasma physics.

torquemada

Thank you for your answer, but I am having trouble understanding the 'that' in the first sentence: Are you saying don't do plasma physics if I want nuclear physics as a purely academic subject, but if I want nuclear engineering I can do either nuclear physics or plasma physics? This seems to imply that nuclear physics as a purely academic discipline (non-applied) doesn't bear fruit for fusion research, am I right? But this is confusing because I thought engineers need theoreticians behind them. Thank you again for any clarification you can provide.

nuclear85

Nuclear physics generally leads to something like high energy physics or accelerator physics. That's not to say it's purely academic, but the application is not *usually* fusion, in the commerical energy sense.

If I understand your first question properly, you want to do fusion research; that is, you want to do something involving actual-fusion-energy-reactor-research. Nuclear physics, as a discipline, does NOT generally lead to this; nuclear engineering (NE) can. Plasma physics is often a subtopic of nuclear engineering, although different programs could be organized differently. In a nuclear engineering graduate degree, you're often doing theory, more often applied theory. You learn some nuclear physics and QM in a NE program, of course.

torquemada

Ok thanks. Very helpful. Another question - what other grad degrees, if any, could lead to fusion reactor research besides NE? Thanks

clope023

Physics and Electrical Engineering also do fusion, for instance.

University of Wisconsin Madison has 3 departments doing Plasma/Fusion research: Physics, EE, and NE.

torquemada

thanks clope. i was also wondering - does focusing on fusion research in grad school shoehorn you into academia only, since it's only in the R&D phase at the moment? Or do grad students in NE that specialize in fusion take enough fission coursework to be marketable in govt/industry with respect to fission positions? thanks

EulersFormula

There are many opportunities in low temperature plasma physics. Scientists with knowledge of plasma physics are in demand for many applications ranging from plasma rockets to semiconductor etching to materials processing to plasma medicine. Opportunities exist in both Industry and at national labs.

mdxyz

Fusion research for a physicist is plasma physics. There may be engineering roles also, mostly to do with materials for walls, divertors, magnets, and so forth.

'Nuclear engineering' is mostly fission-based and the problems don't have a great deal of overlap.

pinkfishegg

So are there a lot of industry jobs for phds in plasma physics? Are they in highly specialized fields? Are the jobs regional? I think nuclear physics and plasma physics are interesting but I would like to have the option to work in industry. I live in the United States but I would like to work in Europe, Canada, Australia, and maybe other countries someday.

mdxyz

Not really. Also the industrial plasmas are very different to high temperature, completely ionised fusion plasmas. On the other hand you can learn incidental skills like programming.

I wouldn't say getting a PhD in fusion theory is likely to be a top employment move. If you want to spend most of your career working in fission you should get a degree relevant to that.

clope023

Mostly but not all; MIT, georgia tech, uw-madison, and several other NE programs do fusion plasma research.

pinkfishegg

Hmm are there any good career moves for a physics phd other than solid state/condensed matter and medical physics in industry? Are there careers in optics/nuclear physics (I've always heard nuclear engineering is a good degree, but nuclear physics isn't the most useful phd out side of academic.

mdxyz

In theory? I'm willing to be proven wrong, but if they do do fusion theory and practical fission work in the same program I very much doubt it will be the same people doing it.

There just isn't a great deal of overlap. Fusion theory is almost entirely about how to hold the plasma in a magnetic bottle; the 'nuclear' bit and details of QM surrounding the reaction itself are basically irrelevant.

There is some overlap in experiment in areas to do with neutron embrittlement and the like.

pinkfishegg - My advice is that if career/money-maximisation is your goal to be an engineer rather than a physicist.

clope023

I've seen plenty of NE departments that do fusion theory and fusion experiment.

pinkfishegg

@mxdyx, I'm not really concerned about getting rich, I just want to know that there's some sort of job security in the field I'm going into. Are all of the engineering fields really that secure or just some of them? I don't like EE very much. I was considering nuclear engineering or alternative energy engineering but the latter may be a lot of EE.

Are you a physicist or an engineer?

EulersFormula

If you go into physics, you will experience job security, provided that you (1) publish a lot and (2) are capable of winning grant money. Also, you must be capable of giving compelling talks because this will build up your reputation (and hence, job security).

From a purely physical standpoint, low temperature plasma physics is different from fusion plasma. However, if you went to Wisconsin and did PhD thesis research on a Tokamak, and you decided to try something different, then I don't think it would be a huge stretch to convince another lab that you're qualified to research, say the chemistry of plasma polymerization. There would be some technical knowledge you'd have to catch up on, but trying to understand something you've never studied before is a skill you should have already learned in graduate school.