Characterization of bistable states in rotating MBX mirror plasmas

In this thesis I report the observation and characterization of bifurcations and bistable states in both AC and DC biased rotating axis-symmetric mirror plasmas in the Magneto Bernoulli eXperiment (MBX). Several control parameters that characterize the bifurcations and bistabilities are identified and their influence on the rotational states is analyzed. The reaction of the plasma to changes in the identified control parameters is shown to be highly nonlinear and asymmetric. Evidence for the asymmetric response of rotating mirror plasmas to the polarity of the applied biasing voltage leading to good potential penetration at positive and bad penetration at negative biasing voltages that was shown before by Quevedo et al. [13] is given.