Adiabatic Compression of Plasma Vortex Structures

Abstract

Plasma vortex structures generated by conical theta-pinch guns have been successfully compressed and amplified by secondary adiabatic compression. A pair of vortex rings meet at the center of a primary magnetic mirror. A secondary mirror starts to compress them as soon as the collision has occurred. Peak ion temperatures of 170 eV have been obtained at an $n\tau$ of ${10}^{12}$ sec/${\mathrm{cm}}^3$ by utilizing a capacitor bank that stores 250 kJ.