Leiden University Student Repository

Opschoor, Joost (2016)

KAM and Melnikov theory describing island chains in plasmas

Bachelor thesis | Natuurkunde (BSc)

In this thesis toroidal plasmas are described by a Hamiltonian system parameterising the magnetic field lines. Application of KAM and Melnikov theory explains the occurance of chaotic island chains bounded by invariant manifolds. In plasma simulations and experiments island chains have shown to be rather stable. This thesis provides a theoretical but nonrigorous argument for this stability and proposes the description of magnetohydrodynamics as a Hamiltonian field theory as a method to rigorously study the stability. Hypotheses are given for a generalisation to nontoroidal structures.

Author

Opschoor, Joost

Faculty

Faculty of Science

Specialisation

Mathematics and Physics

Supervisors

Dalhuisen, Jan Willem
Bouwmeester, Dirk
Doelman, Arjen

ECTS Credits

3

Language

en