ThinCurr: An open-source 3D thin-wall eddy current modeling code for the analysis of large-scale systems of conducting structures
Abstract
In this paper we present a new thin-wall eddy current modeling code, ThinCurr, for studying inductively-coupled currents in 3D conducting structures -- with primary application focused on the interaction between currents flowing in coils, plasma, and conducting structures of magnetically-confined plasma devices. The code utilizes a boundary finite element method on an unstructured, triangular grid to accurately capture device structures. The new code, part of the broader Open FUSION Toolkit, is open-source and designed for ease of use without sacrificing capability and speed through a combination of Python, Fortran, and C/C++ components. Scalability to large models is enabled through use of hierarchical off-diagonal low-rank compression of the inductance matrix, which is otherwise dense. Ease of handling large models of complicated geometry is further supported by automatic determination of supplemental elements through a greedy homology approach. A detailed description of the numerical methods of the code and verification of the implementation of those methods using cross-code comparisons against the VALEN code and Ansys commercial analysis software is shown.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.2412.14962,
title = {ThinCurr: An open-source 3D thin-wall eddy current modeling code for the analysis of large-scale systems of conducting structures},
author = {Christopher Hansen and Alexander Battey and Anson Braun and Sander Miller and Michael Lagieski and Ian Stewart and Ryan Sweeney and Carlos Paz-Soldan},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2412.14962},
year = {2025}
}