This book highlights a high-density helicon plasma source produced by radio frequency excitation in the presence of magnetic fields, which has attracted considerable attention thanks to its wide applicability in various fields, from basic science to industrial use. Presenting specific applications such as plasma thrusters, nuclear fusion, and plasma processing, it offers a review of modern helicon plasma science for a broad readership.

The book covers a wide range of topics, including the fundamental physics of helicon plasma and their cutting-edge applications, based on his abundant and broad experience from low to high temperature plasmas, using various linear magnetized machines and nuclear fusion ones such as tokamaks and reversed field pinches. It first provides a brief overview of the field and a crash course on the fundamentals of plasma, including miscellaneous diagnostics, for advanced undergraduate and early graduate students in plasma science, and presents the basics of helicon plasma for beginners in the field. Further, digesting advanced application topics is also useful for experts to have a quick overview of extensive helicon plasma science research.

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Shunjiro Shinohara is an Emeritus Professor at Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology. His work primarily focuses on the development of a high-density plasma source and their applications. In particular, his work on the Helicon Advanced Plasma Rocket has been supported as a large-scale research project by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS). He received his Ph.D. from the University of Tokyo in 1984. He joined Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology as a Professor in 2010, and was made a Distinguished Professor in 2017. He has served in his current position since 2019, and also as a Visiting Professor at Kyushu University in Fukuoka, Chubu University in Nagoya, and Southwestern Institute of Physics in Chengdu from 2018, and at the University of Science and Technology of China in Hefei from 2019. He was honored with the Science and Technology Award by the Minister of MEXT, Japan for his research on the physical phenomena of high-density helicon wave plasmas and their engineering applications in 2010. In extensive plasma science and technology fields, his current research interests include RF discharges such as helicon discharges, plasma propulsion, nonlinear physics such as bifurcation, self-organization, and turbulent studies, and also the behavior of magnetohydrodynamics.