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Merino-Ahedo Detachment Validation

Reference

Merino, M., & Ahedo, E. (2011). Simulation of plasma flows in divergent magnetic nozzles. IEEE Transactions on Plasma Science, 39(11), 2938–2939.

Physics

This case validates the detachment efficiency as a function of mirror ratio \(R_B\). The Merino-Ahedo hybrid fluid model gives:

\[\eta_{det}(R_B) \approx 1 - \frac{1}{\sqrt{R_B}}\]

Helicon's kinetic PIC should reproduce this trend within 10% over \(R_B \in [2, 10]\).

Configuration

from helicon.validate.cases.merino_ahedo import MerinoAhedoCase
case = MerinoAhedoCase()
configs = case.get_scan_configs()  # 5 mirror ratios

Acceptance Criteria

  • Detachment efficiency within 10% of Merino-Ahedo formula for all \(R_B\) tested
  • Monotonic increase of \(\eta_{det}\) with \(R_B\)

Running

helicon validate --case merino_ahedo

Results

See docs/validation_results/merino_ahedo/ for comparison plots.