Plasma Heating by an Electron Beam in Corrugated Magnetic Field

Abstract

New experimental results from the multimirror trap GOL-3 are presented. Deuterium plasma of $~10^21 m^-3$ density is heated by a high power relativistic electron beam (peak parameters are ~1 MeV, ~25 kA, ~8 $μ$s, ~120 kJ). Magnetic system of the facility is a 12-meter-long axisymmetrical solenoid with corrugated magnetic field, which consists of 55 cells with $B_max/B_min$=4.8/3.2 T. Collective plasma heating by the electron beam results in peak electron temperature ~2 keV. To this time the ions are also collectively heated by gradients of electron pressure in the cells of the trap. Ion temperature increases above 1 keV and confines at the high level for ~1 ms. Dense hot plasma in GOL-3 trap emits D-D neutrons for ~1 ms. Details of collective plasma heating by the beam in the corrugated magnetic field will be presented in the paper. New physical mechanism of effective heating of plasma ions, substantially dependent on the corrugation of the magnetic field, is discussed. Experiments with complete multimirror configuration of the GOL-3 facility have shown the significant improvement of energy confinement time comparing with simple solenoidal configuration. Axial currents, which exist in the system, cause sheared helical structure of the magnetic field. The safety factor q is shown to be below unity on the axis.