MaPLE

MaPLE is an experimental research facility for investigation of magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) phenomena in liquid metal blankets for future fusion reactors using the prototypical alloy PbLi. The facility is designed to enable heat transfer studies in free, forced, or mixed magneto-convection flows in ducts and complex geometries relevant to liquid metal breeder blankets. It features a versatile infrastructure that allows experimental examination of flows at any orientation of test-sections with respect to gravity under a transverse horizontal magnetic field.

Heavy metal,heat, and strong electromagnetic force

Technical description

MaPLE consists of a liquid metal loop containing 70 liters of PbLi (extendable to 115 liters). The loop is permanently kept under an inert argon atmosphere and is designed to operate at temperatures up to 400°C. A permanent magnet pump can deliver a pressure head of 6 bar and flow rates up to 5 kg/s. The facility is equipped with a 70kW heat rejection system for high-heat flux experiments. Magnetohydrodynamic effects are investigated in the gap of a water-cooled 20-ton resistive electromagnet (3000A, 2T), which is supported by a hydraulic lifting and turning frame. This enables experiments at any angle of inclination with respect to gravity and orientation of the magnetic field. The loop is equipped with instrumentation to measure flow properties such as flow rate, pressure drop, temperature and electric potential distribution in test sections at high temperatures.  

Representative Projects

1. Support of ITER test blanket program.
2. Development of liquid metal blankets for a DEMO reactor.
3. Generation of benchmark data for validation of predictive numerical tools.

Representative publications

C. Koehly, C. Courtessole, and L. Bühler. MaPLE PbLi loop: A facility for investigating MHD convective flows. Fusion Engineering and Design, 215:115031, 2025.

C. Mistrangelo, L. Bühler, S. Smolentsev, A. Tassone, G. Fonfría, Y. Jiang, L. Melchiorri, G. Politis, D. Suarez, and F. R. Urgorri. A code-to-code benchmark for magneto-convection in a horizontal duct. Nuclear Fusion, 65(11):116006, 2025.

C. Mistrangelo and L. Bühler. 3D analysis of magneto-convective duct flow in a non-uniform magnetic field. Fusion Engineering and Design, 222:115505, 2026.