Concept for creation and confinement of hot toroidal plasmas*

The Texatron^TM concept for creation and confinement of hot toroidal plasmas is presented along with results of promising early experiments. The ultimate goal of the Texatron^TM Project is to create a compact source of pulsed fusion power.  The Texatron^TM is based on the concept of a “fast pulsed” Torastron  toroidal magnetic plasma confinement device [1] where toroidal plasmas will be created and imploded using fast pulsed magnetic coils. The helical configuration of the pulsed coils creates a rotational transform and high temperatures in the plasma when it implodes to form a toroidal , high beta,  plasma. Formation of shock  heated toroidal plasma configurations have been demonstrated in the Los Alamos Syllac experiments [2] The plasma is created and imploded  with two global flux invariants:  the Wells-Taylor invariant A·B  and the Leaf Turner invariant Ψ² .  MHD relaxation of the resulting hot toroidal plasma has been shown theoretically  to result in Grad-Shafranov toroidal equilibria  with helical magnetic fields and finite beta [3]  Initial experiments and MHD simulations have shown these equilibria occur and will be discussed.

1.     V E Moiseenko et al 2019 Plasma Phys. Control. Fusion 61 065006
   
   2. W.R. Ellis et al 1974 Nucl. Fusion 14 841
   
   3. J.E. Brandenburg, Jou. of Plasma Physics , Volume 43 , Issue 2 , April 1990 , pp. 283 – 290