Omnigenous umbilic stellarators

To better understand the dependence of the magnetic field structure in the plasma edge on the plasma boundary shape, in the context of X-point and island divertor designs, we define and develop a class of stellarators called umbilic stellarators. These equilibria are characterised by a single continuous high-curvature edge on the plasma boundary that goes around multiple times toroidally before meeting itself. We develop a technique that allows us to simultaneously optimise the plasma boundary along with a curve lying on the boundary on which we impose a high curvature while imposing omnigenity – a property of the magnetic field that ensures trapped particle confinement throughout the plasma volume. We find that umbilic stellarators naturally tend to favour piecewise omnigenity instead of omnigenity with a specific helicity. After generating omnigenous umbilic stellarators, we design coil sets for some of them and explore the fieldline structure in the edge and its sensitivity to small fluctuations in the plasma. Finally, using single-stage optimisation, we simultaneously modify the plasma and coil shape and propose an experiment to modify an existing tokamak to a finite- $\beta$ stellarator using this technique and explore a potentially simpler way to convert a limited tokamak into a diverted stellarator.

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Publication Details

Journal
Journal of Plasma Physics
Published
2025-12-01
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1017/s0022377825100925
Primary Topic
Magnetic confinement fusion research
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
0.00

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article

Omnigenous umbilic stellarators

Daniel Dudt, Matt Landreman, Rahul Gaur, Egemen Kolemen et al.
Journal of Plasma Physics
Magnetic confinement fusion research
article

Omnigenous umbilic stellarators

Daniel Dudt, Matt Landreman, Rahul Gaur, Egemen Kolemen, Dario Panici, Rory Conlin, Kaya Unalmis, Yigit Gunsur Elmacioglu, T. M. Elder
article en

Abstract

To better understand the dependence of the magnetic field structure in the plasma edge on the plasma boundary shape, in the context of X-point and island divertor designs, we define and develop a class of stellarators called umbilic stellarators. These equilibria are characterised by a single continuous high-curvature edge on the plasma boundary that goes around multiple times toroidally before meeting itself. We develop a technique that allows us to simultaneously optimise the plasma boundary along with a curve lying on the boundary on which we impose a high curvature while imposing omnigenity – a property of the magnetic field that ensures trapped particle confinement throughout the plasma volume. We find that umbilic stellarators naturally tend to favour piecewise omnigenity instead of omnigenity with a specific helicity. After generating omnigenous umbilic stellarators, we design coil sets for some of them and explore the fieldline structure in the edge and its sensitivity to small fluctuations in the plasma. Finally, using single-stage optimisation, we simultaneously modify the plasma and coil shape and propose an experiment to modify an existing tokamak to a finite- $\beta$ stellarator using this technique and explore a potentially simpler way to convert a limited tokamak into a diverted stellarator.

Journal of Plasma PhysicsVol. 91(6)
Princeton University (US), Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (US), Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics (DE), Thea Energy, Inc. (United States), University of Maryland, College Park (US)
U.S. Department of Energy, Princeton University, Simons Foundation Autism Research Initiative, Advanced Scientific Computing Research
Openalex Percentile: Top 85%
Magnetic confinement fusion research
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