title: Demonstration of plasma startup by coaxial helicity injection.
abstract: The first successful results on the transfer of a coaxial helicity injection (CHI) produced discharge to inductive operation are reported. CHI-assisted plasma startup is more robust than inductive only operation. After hand off for inductive operation, the initial 90 kA of CHI-produced current drops to 40 kA, then ramps up to 170 kA, using only 30 mV s, more than 30% higher than that produced by induction alone. These significant performance enhancing results were obtained on the HIT-II spherical torus experiment (major/minor radius of 0.3/0.2 m).
authors.affiliation: University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195, USA.
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Raman
authors.forename: T R
authors.initials: TR
authors.lastname: Jarboe
authors.forename: B A
authors.initials: BA
authors.lastname: Nelson
authors.forename: V A
authors.initials: VA
authors.lastname: Izzo
authors.forename: R G
authors.initials: RG
authors.lastname: O'Neill
authors.forename: A J
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: Redd
authors.forename: R J
authors.initials: RJ
authors.lastname: Smith