The ability to keep a fusion-temperature plasma well confined is critical to the success of the fusion program. This is often impaired by turbulence and/or macroscopic instabilities.

Today Muni Zhou is a theoretical plasma physicist at Dartmouth University. Formerly, as a PhD student working with Nuno Loureiro in the Nonlinear Plasma Dynamics Group at PSFC at MIT, she turned to MIT’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center’s dedicated partition on MIT’s Engaging Cluster housed at the MGHPCC to accomplish her highly demanding turbulent plasma computations.

The Loreiro Group focuses on addressing these challenges using a powerful code called Viriato, which they developed. Viriato solves complex equations related to plasma behavior. In a recent paper, Zhou, Loureiro, and colleagues used Viriato to explore how electrons gain energy in turbulent environments through interactions with small-scale magnetic waves, known as Kinetic-Alfvén waves.