The MPRL conducts research in the following areas:
- Dusty (complex) plasmas:
- Transport, charging and thermal properties - with emphasis on ion-dust interactions
- Waves and instabilities - particularly dust acoustic / dust density waves
- Analysis and development of microgravity studies of dusty plasmas
- Dusty plasmas in high magnetic fields (from 1 to 4 Tesla)
- Plasma flows:
- Growth and suppression of plasma instabilities associated with plasma flows
- Coordinated studies of electrostatic and electromagnetic ion waves in fusion, space and laboratory plasmas
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- Experiment and diagnostic development:
- Experiment design for fusion, lab, and microgravity plasma studies
- laser induced fluorescence, particle image velocimetry and probe arrays