It is shown that steepening of the radial plasma pressure profile leads to a decrease in the critical value of beta, above which small-scale balloon-type perturbations in a mirror trap become unstable. This means that small-scale ballooning instability leads to a smoothing of the radial plasma profile. This fact seems to have received little attention in the available publications. The critical beta values for the real magnetic field of the gas-dynamic trap was also calculated. In the best configuration the critical beta 0.72 is obtained for a plasma with a parabolic radial pressure profile.
The prospect of stabilization of the $m=1$ ``rigid'' ballooning mode in an open axially symmetric long-thin trap with the help of a conducting lateral wall surrounding a column of isotropic plasma is studied. It is found that for effective wall stabilization, the beta parameter must exceed $70\%$. The dependence of the critical beta on the mirror ratio, the radial pressure profile, and the axial profile of the vacuum magnet has been studied. It is shown that when a conductive lateral wall is combined with conductive end plates simulating attachment of the end MHD stabilizers to the central cel…
With strong gradients in the pedestal of high confinement mode (H-mode) fusion plasmas, gyrokinetic simulations are carried out for the trapped electron and ion temperature gradient modes. A broad class of unconventional mode structures is found to localize at arbitrary poloidal positions or with multiple peaks. It is found that these unconventional ballooning structures are associated with different eigen states for the most unstable mode. At weak gradient (low confinement mode or L-mode), the most unstable mode is usually in the ground eigen state, which corresponds to a conventional balloon…
Ballooning instabilities are widely believed to be a possible triggering mechanism for the onset of substorm and current disruption initiation in the near-Earth magnetotail. Yet the stability of the kinetic ballooning mode (KBM) in a global and realistic magnetotail configuration has not been well examined. In this paper, the growth rate of the KBM is calculated from analytical theory for the two-dimensional Voigt equilibrium within the framework of kinetic magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) model. The growth rate of the KBM is found to be strongly dependent on the field line stiffening factor $S$, whi…
Plasma of a stationary ECR discharge sustained by gyrotron radiation at a frequency of 24 GHz and a power of up to 600 W in a mirror magnetic trap was studied. At pressures near the gas breakdown threshold, the extinction effect of an electron-cyclotron discharge is observed with increasing radiation power. When the cyclotron resonance cross section approaches the magnetic plug, the power threshold corresponding to the discharge extinction decreases. These experimental results confirm the presence of the effect of particles precipitation from the trap as a result of electron-cyclotron resonanc…
The stabilization of ``rigid'' flute and ballooning modes $m = 1$ in an axisymmetric mirror trap with the help of an ideally conducting lateral both in the presence and in the absence of end MHD anchors is studied. The calculations were performed for an anisotropic plasma in a model that simulates the pressure distribution during the injection of beams of fast neutral atoms into the magnetic field minimum at a right angle to the trap axis. It was assumed that the lateral wall has the shape of a cylinder with a variable radius, so that on an enlarged scale it repeats the shape of the plasma col…
Kinetic instabilities in a dense plasma of a continuous ECR discharge in a mirror magnetic trap at the GISMO setup are studied. We experimentally define unstable regimes and corresponding plasma parameters, where the excitation of electromagnetic emission is observed, accompanied by the precipitation of energetic electrons from the magnetic trap. Comprehensive experimental study of the precipitating electron energy distribution and plasma electromagnetic emission spectra, together with theoretical estimates of the cyclotron instability increment proves that under the experimental conditions th…
Recently, antihydrogen atoms were trapped at CERN in a magnetic minimum (minimum-B) trap formed by superconducting octupole and mirror magnet coils. The trapped antiatoms were detected by rapidly turning off these magnets, thereby eliminating the magnetic minimum and releasing any antiatoms contained in the trap. Once released, these antiatoms quickly hit the trap wall, whereupon the positrons and antiprotons in the antiatoms annihilated. The antiproton annihilations produce easily detected signals; we used these signals to prove that we trapped antihydrogen. However, our technique could be co…
We present a drift kinetic model for the free expansion of a thermal plasma out of a magnetic nozzle. This problem relates to plasma space propulsion systems, natural environments such as the solar wind, and end losses from the expander region of mirror magnetically confined fusion concepts such as the Gas Dynamic Trap. The model incorporates trapped and passing orbit types encountered in the mirror expander geometry and maps to an upstream thermal distribution. This boundary condition and quasineutrality require the generation of an ambipolar potential drop of $\sim5 T_e/e$, forming a thermal…
A kinetically stabilized axially symmetric tandem mirror (KSTM) uses the momentum flux of low-energy, unconfined particles that sample only the outer end-regions of the mirror plugs, where large favorable field-line curvature exists. The window of operation is determined for achieving MHD stability with tolerable energy drain from the kinetic stabilizer. Then MHD stable systems are analyzed for stability of the trapped particle mode. This mode is characterized by the detachment of the central-cell plasma from the kinetic stabilizer region without inducing field-line bending. Stability of the t…
Nonlinear effects of the trapping of resonant particles by the combined action of the electric field and the magnetic mirror force is studied using a gyrokinetic description that includes the finite Larmor radius effects. A general nonlinear solution is found that is supported by the nonlinearity arising from the resonant particles, trapped by the combined action of the parallel electric field and the magnetic mirror force. Applying these results to the space plasma conditions, we demonstrate that in the magnetosheath plasma, coherent nonlinear magnetic depression may be created associated wit…
Chirping frequency patterns have been observed in the electron cyclotron emission from strongly nonequilibrium plasma confined in a table-top mirror magnetic trap. Such patterns are typical for the formation of nonlinear phase space structures in a proximity of the wave-particle resonances of a kinetically unstable plasma, also known as the "holes and clumps" mechanism. Our data provides the first experimental evidence for acting of this mechanism in the electron cyclotron frequency domain.
The resonant and non-resonant effects of core plasma on the excitation of low frequency modes with $ω< ω_{BAE}$, such as Beta-induced Alfvén Acoustic Eigenmodes (BAAEs) and Kinetic Ballooning Modes (KBMs) are examined in the framework of the generalized fishbone-like dispersion relation. The formalism of the fishbone-like equation contains all the necessary ingredients to describe the features of these low frequency fluctuations, and explain experimental findings. Core plasma properties (diamagnetic frequency and precession resonance with trapped ions) strongly affect the excitation of the mod…
The plasma equilibrium in a linear trap at $β\approx 1$ (or above the mirror-instability threshold) under the topology-conservation constraint evolves into a kind of diamagnetic "bubble". This can take two forms: either the plasma body greatly expands in radius while containing the same magnetic flux, or, if the plasma radius is limited, the plasma distribution across flux-tubes changes, so that the same cross-section contains a greatly reduced flux. If the magnetic field of the trap is quasi-uniform around its minimum, the bubble can be made roughly cylindrical, with radius much larger than t…
Zebra-like patterns have been observed in the electron cyclotron emission spectra from strongly nonequilibrium plasma confined in a table-top mirror magnetic trap. The analysis of the experimental data suggests that the formation of zebra-like patterns could eventually be related to modulation of the whistler waves by the ion-acoustic waves excited during the abrupt ejection of electrons into a loss cone caused by the development of the whistler instability under the electron cyclotron resonance condition.
In [Viktorov M. E. et al., Eur. Phys. Lett., V.116, P.55001, 2016] we reported on chirping frequency patterns that have been observed in the electron cyclotron emission from strongly nonequilibrium plasma confined in a table-top mirror magnetic trap. These patterns were interpreted qualitatively as the first experimental evidence for so-called "holes and clumps" mechanism acting at such high frequencies (1-10 GHz). In the present paper, we prove this statement on a more rigorous basis, considering the formation of nonlinear phase space structures in proximity of the wave-particle resonances wi…
At present, the GDT facility of the Budker Institute Novosibirsk, which is an axially symmetric magnetic mirror device of gas dynamic trap type, is being upgraded. The first stage of the upgrade is the Synthesised Hot Ion Plasmoid (SHIP) experiment. The experiments will be performed in a small mirror section that is installed at one side of the GDT. The magnetic field on axis will be in the range of 1-7 T and the mirror ratio will amount 1.2-1.4. The mirror is filled with background plasma streaming in from the central cell. Two neutral beam injectors perpendicularly inject a total current up …
Slow dynamical changes in magnetic-field strength and invariance of the particles' magnetic moments generate ubiquitous pressure anisotropies in weakly collisional, magnetized astrophysical plasmas. This renders them unstable to fast, small-scale mirror and firehose instabilities, which are capable of exerting feedback on the macroscale dynamics of the system. By way of a new asymptotic theory of the early nonlinear evolution of the mirror instability in a plasma subject to slow shearing or compression, we show that the instability does not saturate quasilinearly at a steady, low-amplitude lev…
The mirror mode evolving in collisionless magnetised high-temperature thermally anisotropic plasmas is shown to develop an interesting macro-state. Starting as a classical zero frequency ion fluid instability it saturates quasi-linearly at very low magnetic level, while forming elongated magnetic bubbles which trap the electron component to perform an adiabatic bounce motion along the magnetic field. {Further evolution of the mirror mode towards a stationary state is determined by the bouncing trapped electrons which interact with the thermal level of ion sound waves, generate attractive wake …
The ambipolar electrostatic potential rising along the magnetic field line from the grounded wall to the centre in the linear gas dynamic trap, rules the available suppression of axial heat and particle losses. In this paper, the visible range optical diagnostic is described using the Doppler shift of plasma emission lines for measurements of this accelerating potential drop. We used the room temperature hydrogen jet puffed directly on the line of sight as the charge exchange target for plasma ions moving in the expanding flux from the mirror towards the wall. Both bulk plasma protons and $He^…
The ICM plasma is subject to firehose and mirror instabilities at scales of order the ion Larmor radius. The mirror instability generates fluctuations of magnetic-field strength $δB / B \sim 1$. These fluctuations act as magnetic traps for the heat-conducting electrons, suppressing their transport. We calculate the effective parallel thermal conductivity in the ICM in the presence of the mirror fluctuations for different stages of the evolution of the instability. The mirror fluctuations are limited in amplitude by the maximum and minimum values of the field strength, with no large deviations …
Hybrid-kinetic numerical simulations of firehose and mirror instabilities in a collisionless plasma are performed in which pressure anisotropy is driven as the magnetic field is changed by a persistent linear shear $S$. For a decreasing field, it is found that mostly oblique firehose fluctuations grow at ion Larmor scales and saturate with energies $\sim$$S^{1/2}$; the pressure anisotropy is pinned at the stability threshold by particle scattering off microscale fluctuations. In contrast, nonlinear mirror fluctuations are large compared to the ion Larmor scale and grow secularly in time; margi…
