"EAST is now beginning to produce results of significance for ITER and is poised to make unique contributions to the world fusion effort”, writes the report of the 4th EAST International Advisory Committee Meeting (EAST-IAC Meeting).

The EAST-IAC Meeting holds every two years to review EAST research progress and to give a comprehensive report. This year, the forth one was held in ASIPP on June 2-3. Altogether 18 IAC members attended this meeting.

During the meeting, ASIPP presented 14 reports on EAST current status, five-year and next year plan, diagnostics, plasma control, divertor, PFC, theory and simulation, 4.6GHz LHCD, NBI, ECRH, ELM&RMP coil, PWI, W divertor Plan, and EAST’s role for ITER. A distinct feature of this meeting is that about half of these reports were given by young researchers.

Through reviewing the materials, listening to reports and site visits, IAC members got a clear understanding about ASIPP’s research, made an all-round analysis and assessment of EAST research and experiment plan, cooperation and human resources, and wrote a final executive report after the internal meeting.

In the report, the IAC affirms “notable achievements on EAST”, and at the same time recommends on specific research topics as well as broader issues. The recommendation ranges from “the development of a comprehensive two-year plan that integrates experimental objectives with the hardware and diagnostic additions” to “aggressively pursuing broad collaborations with other plasma science and technology institutions in China, recruiting senior scientists and engineers from abroad”.

According to Director Prof Jiangang Li, the recommendations are more important and helpful to ASIPP, he said during a middle-level management meeting that ASIPP will respond to all these IAC recommendations and make more contribution to world fusion community.