Department of Plasma Physics and Fusion Engineering at the University of Science and Technology of China Proposes New Three-Dimensional Magnetic Field Configuration for Stellarators
Stellarators confine high-temperature plasma using three-dimensional magnetic fields generated by external coils, enabling steady-state operation without relying on plasma current and avoiding instabilities such as disruptions, making them the fastest-growing technological route globally. However, if the three-dimensional magnetic field is not carefully optimized, trapped particles can experience significant radial drift, leading to a substantial increase in neoclassical transport losses. To suppress this drift, the magnetic field must satisfy the "omnigenity" condition, meaning that the time-averaged radial drift of all trapped particle orbits is zero. The most widely applied class of omnigenous magnetic fields is poloidal omnigenity (PO), and such configurations are also commonly referred to as quasi-isodynamic (QI) configurations...
2026-08-06