In April 2016, HIDRA had its first plasma, a simple glow plasma discharge, during the Nuclear, Plasma and Radiological Engineering Departments Open house.
With nearly 100 dignitaries and guests including the head of department and Dean of Engineering the HIDRA team was able to demonstrate that all the working components of the device we installed and running and that operations were able to begin.

The first set of data was the characterization of the magnetic flux lines on the machine.
This used an in-house electron beam and fluorescing rod method, which was originally developed on WEGA for W7-X, to see what the magnetic field shape, and thus plasma shape, would look like.
The beam would be scanned across the minor radius of the vacuum vessel and the rod swept through the vessel.
Anywhere an electron beam hit the rod it would light up.
a sensitive astronomical camera was used to image the flux surfaces and compare them to a ray-tracing code to see the validity of the plasma and any error fields present.
Some gas could also be bled in to visually see the electron beams themselves.

Magnetron Plasmas
In April 2016, HIDRA had its first plasma, a simple glow plasma discharge, during the Nuclear, Plasma and Radiological Engineering Departments Open house. With nearly 100 dignitaries and guests including the head of department and Dean of Engineering the HIDRA team was able to demonstrate that all the working components of the device we installed and running and that operations were able to begin.
The first set of data was the characterization of the magnetic flux lines on the machine. This used an in-house electron beam and fluorescing rod method, which was originally developed on WEGA for W7-X, to see what the magnetic field shape, and thus plasma shape, would look like. The beam would be scanned across the minor radius of the vacuum vessel and the rod swept through the vessel. Anywhere an electron beam hit the rod it would light up. a sensitive astronomical camera was used to image the flux surfaces and compare them to a ray-tracing code to see the validity of the plasma and any error fields present. Some gas could also be bled in to visually see the electron beams themselves.
Magnetron Plasmas
Hybrid Illinois Device for Research and Applications