An Alternate Method for Island Rotation Control: Swing Push Entrainment with 3d Fields

2024 Research Campaign, Transient Control

Purpose of Experiment

Previous work demonstrated that magnetic islands in plasmas can be entrained to externally applied 3d fields. By doing this, the magnetic island rotates at the frequency that the external field can be rotated at. However, the frequency of the external field coils is inherently limited. This experiment explores an alternative way of using the external field coils to try to circumvent some of these frequency limitations.

Experimental Approach

The approach for this experiment is analogous to pushing a swing set or spinning a basketball on a finger. Rather than constantly spinning the external field at the frequency of the mode, the slow external coils would be pulsed to deliver regular “pushes” onto the quickly-rotating magnetic island. In theory, these pushes could deliver enough torque to keep the mode spinning.

See more details, including project leads, at U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI).