Distributed chaos and solitons at the edges of magnetically confined plasmas

TL;DR

This paper investigates plasma edge dynamics in magnetic fusion devices, revealing that distributed chaos dominates at low magnetic fields while helical solitons influence behavior at high fields, based on ion saturation current measurements.

Contribution

It demonstrates the transition from distributed chaos to soliton-dominated dynamics at the plasma edges depending on magnetic field strength.

Findings

Distributed chaos dominates at low magnetic fields.

Helical solitons influence plasma behavior at high magnetic fields.

Transitions observed via ion saturation current measurements.

Abstract

It is shown, using results of measurements of ion saturation current in the plasma edges of different magnetic fusion confinement devices (tokamaks and stellarators), that the plasma dynamics in the edges is dominated by distributed chaos with spontaneously broken translational symmetry at low magnetic field, and with spontaneously broken reflexional symmetry (by helical solitons) at high magnetic field.