Personale docente

Piergiorgio Sonato

Professore ordinario

IIET-01/A

Indirizzo: VIA G. GRADENIGO, 6/A - PADOVA . . .

Telefono: 0498277598

E-mail: piergiorgio.sonato@unipd.it

  • presso DII sede di via Gradenigo 6a
    ricevimento su appuntamento via mail

Education
- Doctor in Electrical Engineering in the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Padova (I) with full marks and honours, a.y. 1981-1982
- Post-graduate course on Plasma Engineering and Controlled Thermonuclear Fusion with full marks and honours, a.y. 1982-1983

Professional positions
- From 1984 to 1986 he worked under temporary contracts in the team for the construction of the RFX experiment
- From 1986 to 1998 he was Researcher in the Istituto Gas Ionizzati of the National Research Council
- From 1998 to 2001 he was Associate Professor at the University of Cagliari
- From 2001 to 2011 he was Associate Professor at the University of Padova
- From 2011 he is Full Professor of electrical Science at the University of Padova

Scientific activity
He started working in 1983 for the realization of RFX. He was member of the "Plasma System" group, having responsibility for the following components: first wall, vacuum vessel, stabilizing shell, vacuum and gas injection system, in-vessel remote handling system and magnetic and thermal transducers. In particular he worked on:
- design of the vacuum and gas injection system
- eddy current, electrodynamic forces and electrostatic stresses calculations of various RFX components
- developed an original electromagnetic model of the stabilizing shell
- design, construction, installation and test of the 600 magnetic transducers mounted on RFX;
- development of the RFX active equilibrium control system
From 1992 up to 2001 he assumed the role of "Plasma Engineering" Group Leader in the RFX Organization, in charge of:
- Analysis of plasma-wall interaction
- Construction of a transducer system to measure the Halo Currents
- Development of a vented limiter concept
- Development of in-vessel inspection systems
- Realization of components to improve the magnetic field homogeneity in the gap regions of the stabilizing shell
- Construction of plant for the boronization on the first RFX wall
- Development of a concept to apply a rotating torque to the plasma
In 1993-94 he collaborated with the Plasma Wall Interaction group for the exploitation of the ergodic divertor of Tore Supra
From 1999 to 2004 he collaborated for the application of Neural Network techniques in the prediction of the plasma disruptions in JET
From 2000 to 2006 he was responsible of the electromechanical calculations of the blanket modules and of Ion Cyclotron Antenna for ITER
From 2001 to 2005 he has been Team Leader for the design and construction of the RFX-mod load assembly
From 2003 to 2007 he has been Project Leader construction of the Halo Currents system in JET
In 2004 he started a collaboration with IPP-Garching (G) for the application of real time prediction of the disruptions in ASDEX UG
From 2007 to 2013 he has been Project Manager for the realization of the Neutral Beam Test Facility for ITER
From 2014 to 2017 he has been member of the EUROfusion STAC
From Oct 2017 to March 2022 he has been Director of Consorzio RFX
From April 2022 he is President of Consorzio RFX

Teaching activity
- 1995 to 1998 he taught “Electrical Science” for the Diploma on Information Technology Engineering and Environmental Engineering at Trento University
- 1998 to 2004 he taught “Electrical Science”, “Theory of electric networks” and “Automatic design of electric and magnetic devices” at Cagliari University
- From the academic year 2001/02 he teaches “Electrical Science” and “Industrial Plasma Technologies” at Padova University