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Fusion engineering studies are described that relate to three areas of fusion reactor development. Techniques to examine high-energy alpha transport in tokamak plasmas are described along with results relative to wall bombardment and resultant plasma contamination. Calculations for an experiment planned for TFTR to verify this theory are also included. Studies of plasma heating, fueling and stability for a field-reversed mirror are described that have lead to the concept of a small (less than 10 MWe) reactor labeled SAFFIRE. Finally methods are proposed to improve the efficiency of a reversed-field pinch by extending its burn through refueling and energy-loss control.

The current plasma engineering studies report on three major areas of fusion reactor development. Plasma engineering studies of the field-reversed mirror (FRM) have focused on stability, start-up, and fusion product heating and leakage. A Monte Carlo technique has been developed to study high-energy fusion product transport in the FRM. The stability studies involve use of a perturbation theory applied to orbits calculated with the SUPERLAYER code. Studies of the reversed-field pinches (RFP) have centered around development of a 1-D dynamic MHD code which is designed to investigate enhanced transport, cold particle fueling, fusion product heating, and stability limits. Rotation effects in the field-reversed theta pinch (FRTP) have been examined as a preliminary step in understanding its potential use in a reactor concept such as the moving plasmoid heater (MPH), also briefly examined here. Studies of fusion-product transport effects in tokamaks include plasma heating, blister-induced first wall erosion, and ash buildup limitations on burn time. Finally, other mirror systems studies have been concerned with both first-wall bombardment and plasma buildup during neutral beam injection.