Time-dependent nested-well plasma trap

When arranged in a nested-well configuration, plasma traps of the Penning/Malmberg type become potentially suitable for confining neutral plasmas. The nested-well configuration allows confinement of overlapping electron and ion plasmas. With an ion plasma overlapped by an equal-charge-density electron plasma, the ion density can exceed the severe ion density limit which occurs within traditional single-well plasma traps. With a nested-well configuration which is time dependent, overlapping electron and singly charged-ion plasmas can be confined at the same temperature. Possible uses of thermal neutral plasmas confined within time-dependent nested-well plasma traps include basic plasma science studies and plasma processing applications.