Overview of the Basic Plasma Science Facility*

The Basic Plasma Science Facility (BaPSF) at UCLA is a US national collaborative research facility for studies of fundamental processes in magnetized plasmas sponsored by DOE and NSF.  The centerpiece of the facility is the Large Plasma Device (LAPD), a 20m long, magnetized linear plasma device. LAPD has been utilized to study a number of fundamental processes, including: collisionless shocks, dispersion and damping of kinetic and inertial Alfvén waves, compressional Alfvén waves for ion-cyclotron range of frequencies heating^, flux ropes and magnetic reconnection, three-wave interactions and parametric instabilities of Alfvén waves, turbulence and transport and interactions of energetic ions and electrons with plasma waves.  LAPD is now operating with a new plasma source based on a large area LaB$_6$ cathode along with a new magnet section capable of

producing up to 0.8T fields in the source region.  This new plasma source provides a significant increase in the discharge power density and allows access to higher density and temperature operating regimes.  Along with new gas fueling schemes (gas puffing) and additional pumping, the facility is able to produce axially-uniform plasmas with a range of temperatures and densities.   An overview of recent research using the facility will be given along with a discussion of future plans including

upcoming call for proposals for experimental runtime on LAPD.