Roche T, Dettrick S, Fontanilla A, Gupta S, Onofri M, Romero J A, Steinhauer L C, Tobin M T, Granstedt E M, Galeotti L, Karbashewski S, Magee R M, Yushmanov P, Trask E, Gota H, Abramov S, Allfrey I, Andow R, Arceo V, Aviles J, Barnes D C, Beall M, Bolte N G, Bui D, Ceccherini F, Clary R, DeHaas T, Denlinger B, Van Drie A, Feng P, Gupta D K, Hubbard K, Kinley J S, Knapp K, Koop B, Korepanov S A, Korepanov A, Lau C K, Lieurance D, MacDonald D, Madura D, Margarit J A, Margo J, Marsden P, Matsumoto T, Meekins M P, Mendoza R, Michel R, Monkhorst H, Morehouse M E, Nations M, Necas A, Nicks B S, Page R, Parke E, Paulson J, Phung K, Rogers T W, Schmitz L, Schroeder J H, Settles G N, Sibley A G H, Signorelli M, Smith R J, Snitchler G L, Sokolov V, Song Y, Strashnoy G, Tagney L, Titus J B, Ufnal J, Valentine T, Weixel C E, Weixel S, White C, Wollenberg M, Zhai K, Ziaei S, Tuszewski M, Smirnov A, Putvinski S, Tajima T, Binderbauer M W
TAE Technologies, Inc., Foothill Ranch, CA, USA.
University of California at Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA, USA.
Nat Commun. 2025 Apr 12;16(1):3487. doi: 10.1038/s41467-025-58849-5.
We report evidence of successful generation of field-reversed configuration plasmas by neutral beam injection. This is achieved by trapping the steady-state beams in an initial seed plasma, hence providing a direct source of toroidally directed energetic ion current and increase plasma density and temperature until plasma and magnetic pressures become comparable. Magnetic flux trapping occurs gradually, and the change in topology from open field line to fully a formed field-reversed configuration is complete within ~ 10 ms. Field reversal is first established using a traditional metric and complemented by advanced reconstruction algorithms of the magnetic topology and plasma pressure profiles; observations of characteristic changes to fast-ion orbits inferred from magnetic fluctuations; and an experimentally validated model of field reversal by neutral beam injection. These results establish a field-reversed configuration formation method which may offer technological and economic advantages on a path to a future fusion energy system.
我们报告了通过中性束注入成功产生场反向配置等离子体的证据。这是通过将稳态束捕获在初始种子等离子体中来实现的，从而提供了环形定向高能离子电流的直接来源，并提高了等离子体密度和温度，直到等离子体压力和磁压力变得相当。磁通量捕获逐渐发生，从开放磁力线到完全形成的场反向配置的拓扑变化在约10毫秒内完成。首先使用传统指标建立场反转，并辅以磁拓扑和等离子体压力分布的先进重建算法；从磁涨落推断出的快离子轨道特征变化的观测结果；以及通过中性束注入进行场反转的实验验证模型。这些结果建立了一种场反向配置形成方法，该方法可能在通往未来聚变能源系统的道路上提供技术和经济优势。
