First plasma in the SMART Tokamak, recorded with a super-fast camera in the visible spectrum

The SMART tokamak - an experimental fusion device designed, built and operated by the Plasma Science and Fusion Technology Laboratory of the University of Seville, Spain - has generated its first plasma.

SMART (Small Aspect Ratio Tokamak) is unique due to its flexibility to generate plasmas with different shapes. It will be the first spherical tokamak to fully explore the potential of negative triangularity.

Triangularity refers to the shape of the plasma relative to the tokamak. The cross section of the plasma in a tokamak is typically shaped like the capital letter D. When the straight part of the D faces the center of the tokamak, it is said to have positive triangularity. When the curved part of the plasma faces the centre, the plasma has negative triangularity. Negative triangularity should offer enhanced performance because it can suppress instabilities that expel particles and energy from the plasma, preventing damage to the tokamak wall.

"This is an important achievement for the entire team; we are entering the operational phase of SMART," said Professor Manuel García Muñoz, Principal Investigator of the SMART project.

Professor Eleonora Viezzer, co-Principal Investigator of the project, added: "We were all very excited to see the first magnetically confined plasma and we are looking forward to exploiting the capabilities of the SMART device together with the international scientific community. SMART has sparked great interest all over the world."

The goal of SMART is to provide both the scientific and technological basis for the design of the most compact fusion reactor possible by combining three technologies; spherical tokamaks, negative triangularity and high magnetic field. This first solenoid-induced plasma represents a major achievement for the SMART project, as well as for progress towards the most compact fusion device possible.