Browsing by Subject "High magnetic field"
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Item Megagauss 2.0 : a 10 capacitor system for production of megagauss fields for laser plasma experiments(2013-05) Lewis, Sean Matthew; Bengtson, Roger D.High magnetic fields greater than 100 Tesla applied to laser generated plasmas can generate unique and interesting conditions. High power laser systems at the University of Texas in the Center for Higher Energy Density Sciences readily produce short lived fusion plasmas in cluster targets. A strong magnetic field could increase fusion neutron yield and plasma confinement while providing a unique plasma physics environment. For this purpose, Sandia National Laboratories in collaboration with the University of Texas designed and constructed a pulsed power device to produce more than 2 megaamperes. This current produces strong magnetic fields in small coils with duration on the order of microseconds. At the University of Texas, tests with this device determined the operational characteristics. I will describe the behavior of this device with currents of approximately a megaamp and magnetic fields of more than 60 Tesla. Emphasis is placed on understanding the behavior of the fields and coils.Item MegaGauss : a portable 40T magnetic field generator(2011-05) Wisher, Matthew Louis; Hallock, G. A.; Bengtson, Roger D.Fusion neutrons from high energy density plasmas generated by pulsed laser irradiation of nanoscale atomic clusters have been explored in recent experiments at the University of Texas at Austin. A sufficiently strong (~200 T) magnetic field is expected to produce a magnetized, high temperature (10 keV) plasma with beta [approximately equal to] 1. Such a field along the laser axis may confine the plasma’s radial expansion, thus increasing fusion yield. As part of a multi-stage project to implement this experiment, a scaled (~40 T, ~500 KA) version of the final 200 T, 2.2 MA pulsed power device has been designed and built by Sandia National Laboratories and is now at UT-Austin. This apparatus, named MegaGauss, is meant to serve as a preparation tool for the 200 T system; as such, its current pulse was recorded for analysis, and is compared to a theoretical model to verify its response parameters (e.g. peak current, time to peak). Techniques and results of this comparison are discussed, followed by explanations of basic construction of the 40 T device and current sensing instrumentation. Discussion of MegaGauss is completed with a survey of notable failure modes, and a description of the often severe effects the miniature field-generating Helmholtz coil experiences due to the current pulse and magnetic field. Finally, a novel data archive scheme, structured around the familiar MDSplus archive system, is implemented in Labview and integrated into the main pulsed power control program. Specifically, methods for linking MDSplus’s robust functionality with Labview’s intuitive development environment are realized by means of a specialized software bridge between the two. These methods are used in software that allows MDSplus archives to be written and read exclusively through Labview.