At the SCD, we contribute to the development of nuclear fusion by performing theoretical and computational research in plasma turbulence, which is a factor that strongly limits the performance of nuclear fusion devices. This type of research is relevant in nuclear fusion because, as experiments can be extremely costly and complicated, a theoretical understanding of plasma turbulence is sometimes the only alternative. Furthermore, because of the nonlinearity of the problem and the complex geometries of fusion devices, analytical solutions to the problem of plasma turbulences are not available, and we work on developing computationally intensive numerical methods to treat these problems. Specifically, we optimize the performance and scalability of the community codes GS2 and BOUT++. Such work is vital for efficient use of resources, and for helping to open up the possibility of more routine state-of-the-art multiscale simulations of plasma turbulence.
