Ordinary solids, liquids, and gases are both electrically neutral and too cool or dense to be in a plasma state. The word plasma itself was first applied to ionized gas by Dr. Irving Langmuir, an American chemist and physicist, in 1929.
Energy is needed to strip electrons from atoms to make plasma.
However, without sufficient sustaining power, plasmas recombine into neutral gas. Obviously, in order to maintain a plasma, energy has to be supplied to re-ionize the atoms. Phosphors are relatively efficient at changing uv light into visible light, a process known as fluorescence . Because they are comprised of charged particles, plasmas can be accelerated and steered by electric and magnetic fields, which allows them to be controlled. The aim is to use magnetic fields to confine a plasma produced from hydrogen and then steadily raise its temperature to 100's of millions of degree until the hydrogen nuclei undergo fusion, releasing large amounts of energy.