Speaker
Francesco Schillaci
Description
See the full Abstract at http://ocs.ciemat.es/EPS2018ABS/pdf/P1.2023.pdf
A laser-driven kiloTesla magnetic bottle for plasma confinement
F. Schillaci1, M. De Marco1, L. Giuffrida1, D. Margarone1, G. Korn1
1
FZU, ELI-Bealines Project, Prague, Czech Republic
The possibility to trigger the proton-boron nuclear fusion reaction (p + 11B → 8.5 MeV + 3a)
by using a nsec class laser has been recently demonstrated. This is of high interest since such
reaction does not produce any neutrons but just three alpha-particles, which could be used for
applications in different fields. The possibility to confine the plasma fuel generated during
laser-target interaction through an ultra-intense magnetic field would allow enhancing the
rate of the generated alpha-particles.
In last decades it has been experimentally proved that a small coil-target energized with a
long pulse (nsec-class), high energy (several hundreds of J) laser can produce a quasi-static
(over one nsec) magnetic field of the order of 1 kT.
The combination of several laser beams with the dual purposes of producing a plasma
responsible of the fusion reaction and, using a proper synchronization, energizing two
multiturn coils would enhance the alpha particle rate by confining ions up to few MeV/u in a
small region (less than 1mm^2 in diameter).
We propose the design of an innovative magnetic bottle-like trap made of two multiturn coil
targets able to produce a magnitude field of several kT, which is ideal to confine the plasma
for a relatively long time (few nsec), thus increasing the number of p-B collisions and, hence,
the fusion reaction rate. A complete study of the trap is here reported including magnetic
field analysis, electric, thermal and mechanic behavior and also the confinement efficiency
using particle tracking code simulations. Preliminary experimental result with low energy
laser will also be reported.
