Steering a fusion plasma toward stability

Plasmas in fusion-energy producing devices are gases heated to millions of degrees that can carry millions of amperes of current. These superhot plasmas must be kept away from material surfaces of the vacuum vessel that contains them by using strong magnetic fields. When the gas becomes unstable it can touch the chambers' walls, quickly cooling the plasma and disrupting fusion reactions. Such disruption could potentially harm the walls of future fusion-producing devices. Drs. Jack Berkery and Steve Sabbagh from Columbia University, who work at the U.S. Department of Energy's Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL), have developed a potential way to avoid these instabilities.

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