Inductive plasma source and plasma containment

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10403405-B2
Application number	US-201715405049-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jan 12, 2017
Priority date	Mar 7, 2005
Publication date	Sep 3, 2019
Grant date	Sep 3, 2019

Abstract

A plasma containment system comprises a chamber, a magnetic field generator, and an annular plasma layer that comprises a circulating beam of ions. The chamber includes axial insulating breaks in the chamber wall that run along almost the entire length of the chamber. An inductive plasma source is mountable within the chamber and includes a shock coil assembly and a Laval nozzle to introduce gas into the inductive plasma source. A RF drive comprises a quadrupolar cyclotron located within the chamber and having four azimuthally symmetrical electrodes with gaps there between.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method of generating a plasma comprising the steps of
distributing a neutral gas radially from a circumferentially oriented outlet of a nozzle in a radial direction over and parallel to a coil of parallel wound wires coupled to a disc shaped body,
energizing the coil of parallel wound wires to ionize the neutral gas into a plasma and eject the plasma from the coil of parallel wound wires.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the step of energizing the coil of parallel wound wires includes energizing all wires of the coil of parallel wound wires.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the step of energizing the coil of parallel wound wires includes energizing a first set of the parallel wound wires and energizing a second set of the parallel wound wires after a predetermined amount of time.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the step of energizing the coil of parallel wound wires includes energizing the wires in a synchronized manner.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein the plasma ejected from the coil of parallel wound wires is an annular shaped plasma.

6. The method of claim 1 wherein the step of distributing the neutral gas radially over the coil of parallel wound wires includes radially directing plasma toward an outer periphery of the disc shaped body from the circumferentially oriented outlet of a nozzle.

7. A method of confining plasma within a confinement chamber comprising the steps of
creating a magnetic guide field within a confinement chamber,
distributing a neutral gas radially from a circumferentially oriented outlet of a nozzle in a radial direction over and parallel to a coil of parallel wound wires coupled to a disc shaped body coupled to the confinement chamber,
energizing the coil of parallel wound wires to ionize the neutral gas into a plasma and eject the plasma from the coil of parallel wound wires into the confinement chamber,
rotating the plasma, and
forming a magnetic field having a field reverse configuration (FRC) topology about the rotating plasma.

8. The method of claim 7 wherein the step of rotating the plasma includes rotating the plasma to form a poloidal magnetic self-field surrounding the plasma.

9. The method of claim 8 wherein the step of forming the FRC includes
increasing the rotational energy of the plasma to increase the magnitude of the self-field to a level that overcomes the magnitude of the guide field, and
joining field lines of the guide field and the self-field into the FRC.

10. The method of claim 7 wherein the step of rotating the plasma includes creating an azimuthal electric field within the chamber to cause the plasma to rotate.

11. The method of claim 10 wherein the step of creating the azimuthal electric field includes the step of energizing a betatron flux coil within the chamber and increasing current running through the betatron flux coil.

12. The method of claim 11 wherein the step of increasing the rotational energy of the rotating plasma includes increasing the rate of change of the current running through the betatron flux coil.

13. The method of claim 11 further comprising increasing the rate of change of the current running through the flux coil to accelerate the rotating plasma to fusion level rotational energy.

14. The method of claim 7 wherein the step of energizing the coil of parallel wound wires includes energizing all wires of the coil of parallel wound wires.

15. The method of claim 7 wherein the step of energizing the coil of parallel wound wires includes energizing a first set of the parallel wound wires and energizing a second set of the parallel wound wires after a predetermined amount of time.

16. The method of claim 7 wherein the plasma ejected from the coil of parallel wound wires is an annular shaped plasma.

17. The method of claim 7 wherein the step of creating the guide field includes energizing a plurality of field coils and mirror coils extending about the confinement chamber.

18. The method of claim 7 further comprising increasing the magnitude of the guide field to maintain the rotating plasma at a predetermined radial size.

19. The method of claim 7 further comprising creating an electrostatic well within the chamber.

20. The method of claim 19 further comprising tuning the electrostatic well by manipulating the magnitude of the guide field.

21. The method of claim 19 further comprising injecting high energy ion beams into the FRC and trapping the beams in betatron orbits within the FRC.

22. The method of claim 21 wherein the step of injecting and trapping the high energy ion beams further comprises the steps of
neutralizing the ion beams,
draining the electric polarization from the neutralized ion beams, and
exerting a Lorentz force due to the applied magnetic field on the neutralized ion beams to bend the ion beams into betatron orbits.

23. The method of claim 21 further comprising magnetically confining ions within the FRC and electrostatically confining electrons within the electrostatic well.

24. The method of claim 7 wherein the coil of parallel wound wires is configured to fire the wires of the coil of parallel wound wires in a synchronized manner.

25. The method of claim 7 wherein the wires of the coil of parallel wound wires are combined into a plurality of groups of wires that are azimuthally symmetric about the surface of the disc shaped body of the low inductance coil.

Assignees

• Univ California

Inventors

• Bystriskii Vitaly
• Garate Eusebio
• Song Yuanxu
• Anderson Michael

Classifications

• G21B1/052 Primary

  reversed field configuration · CPC title

• H05H1/46

  using applied electromagnetic fields, e.g. high frequency or microwave energy (H05H1/26 takes precedence) · CPC title

• H05H1/24

  Generating plasma {(nuclear fusion reactors G21B1/00; gas-filled discharge reactors H01J37/32)} · CPC title

• Y02E30/122

  Cross-Sectional Technologies · mapped topic

• Y02E30/10

  Nuclear fusion reactors · CPC title