Understanding trade-offs in stellarator design with multi-objective optimization

Abstract

In designing stellarators, any design decision ultimately comes with a trade-off. Improvements in particle confinement, for instance, may increase the burden on engineers to build more complex coils, and the tightening of financial constraints may simplify the design and worsen some aspects of transport. Understanding trade-offs in stellarator designs is critical in designing high performance devices that satisfy the multitude of physical, engineering and financial criteria. In this study, we show how multi-objective optimization (MOO) can be used to investigate trade-offs and develop insight into the role of design parameters. We discuss the basics of MOO, as well as practical solution methods for solving MOO problems. We apply these methods to bring insight into the selection of two common design parameters: the aspect ratio of an ideal magnetohydrodynamic equilibrium and the total length of the electromagnetic coils.