High-power ion-cyclotron heating on the levitated octupole

Experiments are underway in the Wisconsin Levitated Toroidal Octupole to create hot, dense plasmas to facilitate the study of β limits and related phenomena such as Pfirsch-Schlueter and bootstrap currents. The question of ballooning mode instability limits on β = 8 πnk(T/sub i/+T/sub e/)/B2 is of general importance for all toroidal systems, and ICRF heating should permit study of high β plasmas with lower collisionality and smaller gyroradii than those of the high β gun-injected plasmas currently under study in the Octupole. To these ends we are developing sources capable of delivering 4 MW to the plasma