2025 Symposium on Fusion Engineering (SOFE) Conference

Columbia Fusion Research Center students and faculty attended the 2025 Symposium on Fusion Engineering (SOFE) conference, hosted at MIT from June 23–26. Graduate students Eliot Felske and Chirag Khurana presented the initial design of the Columbia Tritium Extraction Experiment (CTEX), a novel hydrogenic isotope extraction experiment being developed for fusion fuel cycle R&D. Graduate student Sophia Guizzo presented computational work on a magnetohydrodynamic solver for plasma and conducting breeder blanket dynamics, focused on better understanding plasma dynamics when surrounded by conducting tritium breeding blankets in future fusion devices. Recent undergraduate alumnus and incoming graduate student Dylan Schmeling presented recent developments in the design and construction of the Columbia Stellarator Experiment (CSX), highlighting the in-house fabrication of non-planar, high-temperature superconducting magnets. Undergraduate student Maxwell Epstein presented a tokamak control method using Raspberry Pi Pico microcontrollers. Undergraduate alumni Hope Hersom and Pricilla Dua presented the recent operation and design of the Pellets at Columbia (PAC) experiment, a device focused on the interactions between plasmas and cryogenic fuel pellets. Professor Carlos Paz-Soldan chaired a workforce development session and participated in a panel for the Women in Fusion luncheon. The contributions to the conference highlight a broadening of research scope for the Columbia Fusion Research Center, expanding further into the realm of fusion technology and engineering.