System and method for controlling plasma magnetic field
AssigneeGeneral Fusion Inc.
InventorsRyan Walter Zindler, Jonathan Damian Fraser
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Abstract
Examples of a system for generating and confining a compact toroid are disclosed. The system comprises a plasma generator for generating magnetized plasma, a flux conserver for receiving the compact toroid, a power source for providing current pulse and a controller for actively controlling a current profile of the pulse to keep plasma's q-profile within pre-determined range. Examples of methods of controlling a magnetic lifetime of a magnetized plasma by controlling a current profile of the current pulse are disclosed.
Claims10
A system for controlling magnetic lifetime of a magnetized plasma, the system comprising:
- a controller comprising an input unit, a processing unit and an output unit;
- a plurality of measuring probes positioned at various radial, axial and angular positions, each of the plurality of measuring probes configured to provide signals of at least one parameter of the plasma to the input unit of the controller;
- and
- a power source in communication with the output unit of the controller, the power source configured to provide one or more additional current pulses to the system to increase a toroidal magnetic field of the plasma, and having means for adjusting an inductance-to-resistance (L/R) time constant of the power source to adjust a current decay of the current pulses,
- the controller having a memory comprising program code executable by the processing unit to process the signals obtained from the plurality of measuring probes to detect an irregularity in the obtained signals and trigger the power source to provide an additional current pulse based on a detected irregularity in the signal of at least one probe,
- wherein the L/R time constant of the power source is adjusted to be shorter than a shortest decay time of a poloidal field of the plasma.
A method for controlling a magnetic lifetime of a magnetized plasma, the method comprising:
- adjusting an inductance to resistance (L/R) time constant of a power source to be shorter than a shortest decay time of a poloidal field of the magnetized plasma;
- measuring one or more parameters of the plasma by a plurality of probes positioned at various radial, axial and angular positions in a wall of a flux conserving chamber to detect the parameters at various position from a magnetic axis of the plasma;
- processing signals obtained from the plurality of probes and detecting an irregularity in the obtained signals;
- and
- triggering the power source to provide an additional current pulse based on a detected irregularity in a signal of at least one probe.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.