Baseball magnetic field

A magnet coil shaped like the seams on a baseball is being used to study plasma containment and stability at Lawrence Radiation Laboratory in Livermore. The baseball‐seam coils produce a minimum‐B magnetic field, in which field intensity is a minimum in the center, increasing in all directions outward. Such a system is hydromagnetically stable (no fluting). The first baseball assembly began running in April and a superconducting version will soon be up to bat.