The core charge-exchange diagnostic at the Joint European Torus (JET) provides measurements of the impurity ion temperature T(i), toroidal velocity V(phi), and impurity ion densities n(imp), across the whole minor radius. A contribution to the uncertainty of the measured quantities is the error resulting from the multi-Gaussian fit and photon statistics, usually quoted for each measured data. Absolute intensity calibration and especially alignment of the viewing directions can introduce an important systematic error. The technique adopted at JET to reduce this systematic contribution to the error is presented in this paper. The error in T(i), V(phi), and n(imp) is then discussed depending on their use.

The formation of local regions of the high-temperature, high-pressure plasma, 'hot-spots', in a vacuum spark is studied using X-ray spectroscopy and holography. Measurements of the dimensions of the hot-spots, of the absolute flux of radiation and of the spectral composition of the X-ray emission, have been analysed to give order-of-magnitude values for the local electron density, temperature and plasma lifetime. It appears that the plasma pressure is >or approximately=107 atm and that the formation of the hot spots requires intense heating rates more commonly associated with focused laser beams, i.e. >or approximately=1015 W cm-3. It is probable that in the vacuum spark electron beams are responsible for plasma heating. Possible mechanisms for concentrating energy deposition in localised regions are discussed.

Introduction: Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) is a non-invasive brain stimulation technique used to modulate human brain and behavioural function in both research and clinical interventions. The combination of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) with tDCS enables researchers to directly test causal contributions of stimulated brain regions, answering questions about the physiology and neural mechanisms underlying behaviour. Despite the promise of the technique, advances have been hampered by technical challenges and methodological variability between studies, confounding comparability/replicability. Methods: Here tDCS-fMRI at 3T was developed for a series of experiments investigating language recovery after stroke. To validate the method, one healthy volunteer completed an fMRI paradigm with three conditions: (i) No-tDCS, (ii) Sham-tDCS, (iii) 2mA Anodal-tDCS. MR data were analysed in SPM12 with region-of-interest (ROI) analyses of the two electrodes and reference sites. Results: Quality assessment indicated no visible signal dropouts or distortions introduced by the tDCS equipment. After modelling scanner drift, motion-related variance, and temporal autocorrelation, we found no field inhomogeneity in functional sensitivity metrics across conditions in grey matter and in the three ROIs. Discussion: Key safety factors and risk mitigation strategies that must be taken into consideration when integrating tDCS into an fMRI environment are outlined. To obtain reliable results, we provide practical solutions to technical challenges and complications of the method. It is hoped that sharing these data and SOP will promote methodological replication in future studies, enhancing the quality of tDCS-fMRI application, and improve the reliability of scientific results in this field. Conclusions: The method and data provided here provide a technically safe, reliable tDCS-fMRI procedure to obtain high quality MR data. The detailed framework of the Standard Operation Procedure SOP (https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4606564) systematically reports the technical and procedural elements of our tDCS-fMRI approach, which we hope can be adopted and prove useful in future studies.