Evaluation of Spatial Resolution of Neutron Profile Monitor in LHD

The vertical neutron camera (VNC) has been developed to measure neutron emission profile in deuterium plasmas of the large helical device (LHD). The experiment on spatial resolution evaluation for VNC was carried out in November 2016 by using a
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Cf neutron source of 800 MBq. The neutron source was introduced into the LHD vacuum vessel through an aluminum pipe from an upper diagnostics port to the equatorial plane. The source was placed at the following two positions. The first position is just on the cylindrical collimator axis, and the second position is in the middle of two neighboring collimator axes. The stilbene scintillation detectors are aligned radially at the collimator end to detect unscattered fast-neutrons generated in a deuterium plasma. The 3-D neutron transport calculations by using a general-purpose Monte Carlo N-particle code 6 reproduced the experimentally obtained neutron counting rate, indicating that VNC has sufficient spatial resolution and the crosstalk between two neighboring collimators is a fairly small fraction. It is expected that the VNC on LHD will function as a tool for the study on the radial transport of energetic ions.