Development of laser beam injection system for the Edge Thomson Scattering (ETS) in ITER

This paper focuses on the design and development of the laser injection system for the ITER Edge Thomson Scattering system (ETS). The ITER ETS achieves a temporal resolution of 100 Hz by firing two 50 Hz laser beams alternatively. The use of dual lasers enables us to perform the Thomson scattering measurements at a temporal resolution of 50 Hz in case that one of the laser systems stops functioning. A new type of beam combiner was developed to obtain a single beam that is collinear and fixed linearly polarized from two laser beams using a motor-driven rotating half-wave plate. The rotating half-wave plate method does not induce misalignment even if the rotating mechanism malfunctions. The combined beam is relayed from the diagnostic hall to the plasma using mirror optics and is absorbed at the beam dump integrated on the inner blanket. The beam alignment system was designed to direct the laser beam onto the center of the beam dump head. The beam position at the beam dump is monitored by four alignment laser beams which propagate parallel to the diagnostic Nd:YAG laser beam and imaging systems installed outside the diagnostic port.