Improved energy confinement in spheromaks with reduced field errors

Spheromak formation by steady inductive helicity injection

A spheromak is formed for the first time using a new steady state inductive helicity injection method. Using two inductive injectors with odd symmetry and oscillating at 5.8 kHz, a steady state spheromak with even symmetry is formed and sustained through nonlinear relaxation. A spheromak with about 13 kA of toroidal current is formed and sustained using about 3 MW of power. This is a much lower power threshold for spheromak production than required for electrode-based helicity injection. Internal magnetic probe data, including oscillations driven by the injectors, agree with the plasma being in the Taylor state. The agreement is remarkable considering the only fitting parameter is the amplitude of the spheromak component of the state.

Spheromak as a relaxed state with minimum dissipation

The principle of minimum dissipation of energy is utilized to obtain the spheromak configuration as a relaxed state. The Euler-Lagrange equation for the minimum dissipative relaxed state is solved in terms of Chandrasekhar-Kendall eigenfunctions analytically generalized in the complex domain. This state is non-force-free and further shows the nonconstancy of the ratio of parallel current to the magnetic field.

Suppression of MHD fluctuations leading to improved confinement in a gun-driven spheromak

Magnetic fluctuations have been reduced to approximately 1% during discharges on the Sustained Spheromak Physics Experiment by shaping the spatial distribution of the bias magnetic flux in the device. In the resulting quiescent regime, the safety factor profile is nearly flat in the plasma and the dominant ideal and resistive MHD modes are greatly reduced. During this period, the temperature profile is peaked at the magnetic axis and maps onto magnetic flux contours. Energy confinement time is improved over previous reports in a driven spheromak.