Effect of surface segregation and mobility on erosion of plasma-facing materials in magnetic fusion systems

Abstract The present work studies the combined effects of collisional sputtering and mixing processes of carbon impurities in tungsten plasma-facing material integrated with thermal processes including surface segregation and diffusion. We used our ITMC-DYN package, which includes description of all collisional and thermal processes, for the analysis of recent experimental results of tungsten erosion and carbon implantation at various target temperatures. Self-consistent integrated modeling predicted thermal processes effects on erosion/deposition dynamics and defined decisive parameters range and their importance. Critical parameters were estimated based on available experimental data. The integrated simulation reproduced the experimental results and predicted the transition from enhanced tungsten erosion to significant carbon coverage on the tungsten surface. These effects for wider range of system conditions with C/H ions irradiation and for reactor conditions can be predicted by including detailed modeling of chemical erosion processes in a self-consistent manner.