RUI: Approach to Thermal Equilibrium for Electron Plasma in Non-Uniform Magnetic Field Traps

这个项目旨在探索如何用不同的磁瓶捕获大量的电子。这些结果对于扩展我们对等离子体阱对称性的理解非常重要，并将帮助我们制造物质-反物质等离子体，这是一种独特的等离子体，存在于中子星周围，存在于早期宇宙中。该项目还将通过让本科生参与进来，将研究和教育结合起来。非中性等离子体被限制在均匀磁场陷阱中，可以达到热平衡并被无限期限制。这样的热平衡状态是根据系统的对称性来理解的，即标准角动量守恒。目前尚不清楚这种状态是否存在于更复杂的磁几何形状中；现有的理论表明，它们不存在于环面磁场中，但它们可能存在于偶极磁场中。该项目旨在测试这些理论，并开发一个合适的电子等离子体目标，用于在悬浮偶极子场中注入正电子和产生正电子等离子体。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This project seeks to explore how large collections of electrons can be trapped with different magnetic bottles. The results will be important for extending our understanding of the role of the symmetry of traps for plasmas and will help us make matter-antimatter plasmas, a unique kind of plasma that exists around neutron stars and that existed in the early universe. The project will also integrate research and education by engaging undergraduate students in the effort. Non-neutral plasmas confined in uniform magnetic field traps can come to thermal equilibrium and be confined indefinitely. Such thermal equilibrium states are understood in terms of symmetry of the system, namely the conservation of canonical angular momentum. It is not clear whether such states exist for more complicated magnetic geometries; existing theory suggests they do not exist in a toroidal magnetic field, but that they may exist for a dipole magnetic field. This project seeks to test these theories and to develop a suitable electron plasma target for injection of positrons and creation of a positron-electron plasma in a levitated dipole field.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.