학술논문

Pulsed-Power Magnetized Jets for the Study of Star Formation
Document Type
Conference
Source
2020 IEEE International Conference on Plasma Science (ICOPS) Plasma Science (ICOPS), 2020 IEEE International Conference on. :327-327 Dec, 2020
Subject
General Topics for Engineers
Nuclear Engineering
Photonics and Electrooptics
Power, Energy and Industry Applications
Plasma jets
Magnetic resonance imaging
Electric shock
Conferences
Wires
Lasers
Transformers
Language
ISSN
2576-7208
Abstract
We present the first results of a laboratory-astrophysics experiment with the goal of translating research performed at a major (several kJ) laser facility 1 into the pulsed-power laboratory at the Michigan Accelerator for Inductive Z-Pinch Experiments (MAIZE). We aim to explore the interactions of magnetized plasma flows in astrophysical accretion shock events found in the star formation process of highly magnetic T Tauri stars. In these first preliminary results, we a focus on the structure and development of shock instabilities. To accomplish this, we generated magnetized plasma flows via pulsed-power in the Linear Transformer Drive (LTD) at the University of Michigan, by ablating aluminum wire arrays with currents in the order of 1 Mega-Amp. We use a conical array that drives a plasma jet 2 and a 5 Tesla, Helmholtz coil providing a uniform axial magnetic field. Our first images come from self-emission and shadowgraphy captured by a fast-frame camera, showing the structure and evolution of the plasma jet.