Speaker
Description
This talk will be a review of the principle space and astrophysical plasma relevant experiments undertaken at Wisconsin Plasma Physics Laboratory (WiPPL) since the last IPELS meeting. WiPPL is a collaborative user facility, operating the Big Red Ball (BRB) and the Madison Symmetric Torus (MST) out of the Physics Department at the University of Wisconsin, hosting users from around the world. I will give highlights on experiments on magnetic reconnection in the TREX configuration on the BRB, plasma self-organization in tokamak plasmas in MST, runway electron generation of Whistler waves and relaxation, perpendicular and parallel shocks using pulsed power on BRB, and studies of flow domimnated plasmas in the geometry of the Parker Spiral and in Couette flow. I will end with new directions that might be taken on the Wisconsin HTS Axisymmetric Mirror, whose supersonic exhaust through a DeLaval-like magnetic nozzle may offer a path to a collisionless, highly anisotropic expanding plasma like the solar wind.
