RUI: Using a Sectored Conducting Wall to Study Normal Modes and Transport in a Toroidal Electron Plasma

一种有希望的聚变发电途径是托卡马克-一种环形（或百吉饼形）磁约束装置，限制由带正电的离子和带负电的电子组成的热等离子体。 另一方面，非中性等离子体由相对较冷的粒子组成，所有粒子都是一种类型（带正电荷或负电荷），通常被捕获在使用电场和磁场组合的直装置中。 这种非中性系统用于存储反物质，也可作为量子计算元件和下一代精确时间标准的候选者。 劳伦斯大学是一所四年制的文理学院，该项目可能被描述为“介于时钟和热点之间”，因为它使用环形磁场（如托卡马克）来限制和研究纯电子（即，非中性）等离子体。 该装置是在NSF/DOE的支持下设计和建造的，具有独特的优势，可以探索在弯曲且不均匀的磁场中带电粒子收集物理学的未经测试的基本方面，该磁场会自行闭合。 该项目将为本科生提供研究经验（以及科学作者和演讲机会）。在这种小型大学环境中的本科生研究经验往往比在大型机构中的类似经验提供更全面的研究技能培训，从而为发展技术领域的未来劳动力做出重要贡献。由于劳伦斯成功吸引了女性物理专业的学生（过去5年中物理专业毕业生的27%），并增加了大学的少数民族入学率（自2000年以来增加了145%），这项研究将积极影响代表性不足的群体在物理博士管道中的参与。该设备还将用于招募有前途的高中生参加劳伦斯大学的物理课程，并使校园和当地社区接触等离子体物理学。

A promising route to fusion power for electricity production is the tokamak - a toroidal (or bagel-shaped) magnetic confinement device that confines hot plasma composed of positively charged ions and negatively charged electrons. Non-neutral plasma, on the other hand, which is composed of relatively cold particles all of one type (either positively or negatively charged), is typically trapped in a straight device that uses a combination of electric and magnetic fields. Such non-neutral systems are used to store antimatter and also serve as candidates for quantum computing elements and next generation precision time standards, among other uses. The project at Lawrence University, a four-year liberal arts college, might be characterized as lying "between a clock and a hot place," as it uses a toroidal magnetic field (like the tokamak) to confine and study a pure electron (i.e., non-neutral) plasma. The apparatus, which was designed and constructed with prior NSF/DOE support, is uniquely positioned to explore untested fundamental aspects of the physics of charged particle collections in a curved and non-uniform magnetic field that closes on itself. The project will provide research experiences (as well as scientific authorship and presentation opportunities) for undergraduate students. Undergraduate research experiences in this small college environment tend to provide more comprehensive research skills training than comparable experiences at larger institutions, thereby contributing in significant ways to developing the future workforce in technical fields. Thanks to Lawrence's success in attracting women physics majors (27% of the physics graduates in the last 5 years) and increasing minority enrollment in the university (145% increase since 2000), the research will positively impact the engagement of underrepresented groups in the physics PhD pipeline. The apparatus will also be used to recruit promising high school students to the Lawrence University physics program and expose the campus and local communities to the subject of plasma physics.