Route to Drift Wave Chaos and Turbulence in a Bounded Low-βPlasma Experiment

Abstract
The transition scenario from stability to drift wave turbulence is experimentally investigated in a magnetized low- β plasma with cylindrical geometry. It is demonstrated that the temporal dynamics is determined by the interaction and destabilization of spatiotemporal patterns, in particular, traveling waves. The analysis of the temporal and the spatiotemporal data shows that the bifurcations sequence towards weakly developed turbulence follows the Ruelle-Takens scenario.