Confinement Time Exceeding One Second for a Toroidal Electron Plasma
- Department of Physics, Lawrence University, Appleton, Wisconsin 54912 (United States)
Nearly steady-state electron plasmas are trapped in a toroidal magnetic field for the first time. We report the first results from a new toroidal electron plasma experiment, the Lawrence Non-neutral Torus II, in which electron densities on the order of 10{sup 7} cm{sup -3} are trapped in a 270 deg. toroidal arc (670 G toroidal magnetic field) by application of trapping potentials to segments of a conducting shell. The total charge inferred from measurements of the frequency of the m=1 diocotron mode is observed to decay on a 3 s time scale, a time scale that approaches the predicted limit due to magnetic pumping transport. Three seconds represents {approx_equal}10{sup 5} periods of the lowest frequency plasma mode, indicating that nearly steady-state conditions are achieved.
- OSTI ID:
- 21123878
- Journal Information:
- Physical Review Letters, Vol. 100, Issue 15; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.100.155001; (c) 2008 The American Physical Society; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0031-9007
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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