28th EPS Conference on Controlled Fusion and Plasma Physics

The 28th EPS Conference on Controlled Fusion and Plasma Physics was held at the `Madeira Tecnopolo' conference centre in Funchal, Portugal from 18 to 22 June 2001. It was organized by the Centro de Fusão Nuclear (CFN) on behalf of the Contract of Association between the European Atomic Energy Community and the Instituto Superior Técnico (IST), Lisbon and held under the auspices of the Plasma Physics Division of the European Physical Society (EPS). The members of the Local Organizing Committee were drawn from CFN:C Varandas, ChairmanM E Manso, Vice-ChairmanC Silva, Scientific SecretaryM F Pinto, Administrative SecretaryF SerraP VarelaA SilvaM BenilovFollowing the guidelines of the Board of the EPS Plasma Physics Division, the 2001 Conference included topics from the areas of: tokamaks; stellarators; high-intensity laser-produced plasmas and inertial fusion; alternative magnetic confinement; plasma edge physics; plasma heating and current drive; diagnostics; basic plasma physics; astrophysical and geophysical plasmas; and applied plasma physics. The scientific programme and paper selection were the responsibility of the International Programme Committee, appointed by the Board of the EPS Plasma Physics Division, and whose members were:D J Campbell, Chairman, EFDA CSU, Garching, GermanyJ Drake, APS-PPD, University of Maryland, USAJ Honrubia, Universidad Politecnica, Madrid, SpainS Karttunen, VTT, Espoo, FinlandS Kuhn, Universität Innsbruck, AustriaS Lebedev, Ioffe Institute, St Petersburg, RussiaB Saoutic, CEA-DRFC, Cadarache, FranceT N Todd, UKAEA, Dounreay, United KingdomB Unterberg, FZJ, Jülich, GermanyC Varandas, Local Organizing Committee, IST-CFN, Lisbon, PortugalV Vershkov, Kurchatov Institute, Moscow, Russia Villard, CRPP-EPFL, Lausanne, SwitzerlandF Wagner, Chair, EPS-PPD, IPP Greifswald, GermanyM Watkins, EFDA CSU, Culham, United KingdomJ Weiland, Chalmers University, Gothenburg, SwedenO Willi, Heinrich-Heine-Universität, Düsseldorf, GermanyThe conference was attended by 620 participants from 34 countries. The Programme Committee selected five review, three tutorial and 23 topical invited lectures. The 580 contributed papers were presented in five poster sessions with 33 also being selected for oral presentation. Additional features of the conference included the Hannes Alfvén Memorial Prize lecture, presented by Professor V D Shafranov, and an evening discussion session at which representatives of the guiding committees of the European Fusion Programme outlined ideas for its development during the 6th European Framework Programme (2003-2006) in view of the possibility of initiating ITER construction during that period. The session allowed members of the European fusion laboratories to exchange ideas with the committee representatives. The conference was also significant for the range and quality of the results from the operation and scientific exploitation of the JET Facilities by the EURATOM Associations under the European Fusion Development AgreementThe four-page contributed papers are published without refereeing on a CD-ROM in the Europhysics Conference Abstracts series, volume 25A, and a provisional collection of the electronically submitted papers has been made available at the conference website (http://www.cfn.ist.utl.pt/EPS2001/fin/). This service has been made available through the ELISE conference submission programme developed by CRPP-EPFL, Lausanne.29 of the invited papers presented at the conference, together with the Hannes Alfvén Memorial Prize lecture by Professor V D Shafranov, are published in this special issue of Plasma Physics and Controlled Fusion, which will be sent to all registered participants of the conference. These papers were reviewed by members of the Programme Committee according to the normal rules for publication in the journal and are published from the final version submitted by the authors, who remain responsible for their presentation and the accuracy of their papers.The Guest Editors wish to express their appreciation to the authors and the members of the Programme Committee for their work in preparation and review of the manuscripts, and would like to acknowledge the Publishers for their co-operation in the preparation of this special issue.D J Campbell and C VarandasGuest Editors