Abstract:
The high magnetic field helicon experiment system is a helicon wave plasma (HWP) source device in a high axial magnetic field (
B0 ) developed for plasma–wall interactions studies for fusion reactors. This HWP was realized at low pressure (5 × 10
−3 − 10 Pa) and a RF (radio frequency, 13.56 MHz) power (maximum power of 2 kW) using an internal right helical antenna (5 cm in diameter by 18 cm long) with a maximum B 0 of 6300 G. Ar HWP with electron density ~10
18–10
20 m
−3 and electron temperature ~4–7 eV was produced at high
B0 of 5100 G, with an RF power of 1500 W. Maximum Ar
+ ion flux of 7.8 × 10
23 m
−2 s
−1 with a bright blue core plasma was obtained at a high
B0 of 2700 G and an RF power of 1500 W without bias. Plasma energy and mass spectrometer studies indicate that Ar
+ ion-beams of 40.1 eV are formed, which are supersonic (~3.1c s). The effect of Ar HWP discharge cleaning on the wall conditioning are investigated by using the mass spectrometry. And the consequent plasma parameters will result in favorable wall conditioning with a removal rate of 1.1 × 10
24 N
2/m
2h.