A. D. Turnbull

Optimizing stability, transport, and divertor operation through plasma shaping for steady-state scenario development in DIII-D

Recent studies on the DIII-D tokamak [J. L. Luxon, Nucl. Fusion 42, 614 (2002)] have elucidated key aspects of the dependence of stability, confinement, and density control on the plasma magnetic configuration, leading to the demonstration of nearly noninductive operation for >1u2002s with pressure 30% above the ideal no-wall stability limit. Achieving fully noninductive tokamak operation requires high pressure, good confinement, and density control through divertor pumping. Plasma geometry affects all of these. Ideal magnetohydrodynamics modeling of external kink stability suggests that it may be optimized by adjusting the shape parameter known as squareness (ζ). Optimizing kink stability leads to an increase in the maximum stable pressure. Experiments confirm that stability varies strongly with ζ, in agreement with the modeling. Optimization of kink stability via ζ is concurrent with an increase in the H-mode edge pressure pedestal stability. Global energy confinement is optimized at the lowest ζ tested, wi...

Progress toward steady-state tokamak operation exploiting the high bootstrap current fraction regime

Recent DIII-D experiments have increased the normalized fusion performance of the high bootstrap current fraction tokamak regime toward reactor-relevant steady state operation. The experiments, conducted by a joint team of researchers from the DIII-D and EAST tokamaks, developed a fully noninductive scenario that could be extended on EAST to a demonstration of long pulse steady-state tokamak operation. Improved understanding of scenario stability has led to the achievement of very high values of βp and βN, despite strong internal transport barriers. Good confinement has been achieved with reduced toroidal rotation. These high βp plasmas challenge the energy transport understanding, especially in the electron energy channel. A new turbulent transport model, named TGLF-SAT1, has been developed which improves the transport prediction. Experiments extending results to long pulse on EAST, based on the physics basis developed at DIII-D, have been conducted. More investigations will be carried out on EAST with m...

Three-dimensional equilibria and island energy transport due to resonant magnetic perturbation edge localized mode suppression on DIII-D

Experiments in the DIII-D tokamak show that the plasma responds to resonant magnetic perturbations (RMPs) with toroidal mode numbers of nu2009=u20092 and nu2009=u20093 without field line reconnection, consistent with resistive magnetohydrodynamic predictions, while a strong nonlinear bifurcation is apparent when edge localized modes (ELMs) are suppressed. The magnetic response associated with this bifurcation is localized to the high field side of the machine and exhibits a dominant nu2009=u20091 component despite the application of a constant amplitude, slowly toroidally rotating, nu2009=u20092 applied field. The nu2009=u20091 mode is born locked to the vacuum vessel wall, while the nu2009=u20092 mode is entrained to the rotating field. Based on these magnetic response measurements and Thomson scattering measurements of flattening of the electron temperature profile, it is likely that these modes are magnetic island chains near the H-mode pedestal. The reduction in ∇Te occurs near the qu2009=u20094 and 5 rational surfaces, suggesting five unique islands are p...

Boundary perturbations coupled to core 3/2 tearing modes on the DIII-D tokamak

High confinement (H-mode) discharges on the DIII-D tokamak are routinely subject to the formation of long-lived, non-disruptive magnetic islands that degrade confinement and limit fusion performance. Simultaneous, 2D measurement of electron temperature fluctuations in the core and edge regions allows for reconstruction of the radially resolved poloidal mode number spectrum and phase of the global plasma response associated with these modes. Coherent, n = 2 excursions of the plasma boundary are found to be the result of coupling to an n = 2, kink-like mode which arises locked in phase to the 3/2 island chain. This coupling dictates the relative phase of the displacement at the boundary with respect to the tearing mode. This unambiguous phase relationship, for which no counter-examples are observed, is presented as a test for modeling of the perturbed fields to be expected outside the confined plasma.

Interaction of external n = 1 magnetic fields with the sawtooth instability in low-q RFX-mod and DIII-D tokamaks

External n = 1 magnetic fields are applied in RFX-mod and DIII-D low safety factor Tokamak plasmas to investigate their interaction with the internal MHD dynamics and in particular with the sawtooth instability. In these experiments the applied magnetic fields cause a reduction of both the sawtooth amplitude and period, leading to an overall stabilizing effect on the oscillations. In RFX-mod sawteeth eventually disappear and are replaced by a stationary m = 1, n = 1 helical equilibrium without an increase in disruptivity. However toroidal rotation is significantly reduced in these plasmas, thus it is likely that the sawtooth mitigation in these experiments is due to the combination of the helically deformed core and the reduced rotation. The former effect is qualitatively well reproduced by nonlinear MHD simulations performed with the PIXIE3D code. The results obtained in these RFX-mod experiments motivated similar ones in DIII-D L-mode diverted Tokamak plasmas at low q 95. These experiments succeeded in reproducing the sawtooth mitigation with the approach developed in RFX-mod. In DIII-D this effect is correlated with a clear increase of the n = 1 plasma response, that indicates an enhancement of the coupling to the marginally stable n = 1 external kink, as simulations with the linear MHD code IPEC suggest. A significant rotation braking in the plasma core is also observed in DIII-D. Numerical calculations of the neoclassical toroidal viscosity (NTV) carried out with PENT identify this torque as a possible contributor for this effect.

Non-axisymmetric magneto- hydrodynamic equilibrium in the presence of internal magnetic islands and external magnetic perturbation coils

Non-axisymmetric equilibria arise in DIII-D discharges that are subjected to magnetic perturbation by 3D magnetic coils. But, 3D shaping of the entire plasma, including the boundary, also occurs in the rotating fluid frame of saturated internal magnetic islands (Tobias et al 2013 Plasma Phys. Control. Fusion 55 095006). This is advantageous since internal islands and kink responses that rotate near the fluid velocity of the plasma are easily diagnosed, while static perturbations in the laboratory frame are not. The helicity of the perturbed shape is the same in both rotational frames of reference, making one mode a diagnostic proxy for the other and allowing internal modes to be used as a source of data for comparison to models typically applied to understanding the effect of static perturbations. Discrepancies with ideal magneto-hydrodynamic equilibrium obtained by the IPEC (Park et al 2007 Phys. Plasmas 14 052110) method brings attention to the treatment of plasma displacements near rational surfaces and their relationship to the accessibility of equilibrium states.

MONTE-CARLO SIMULATION OF HIGH HARMONIC FAST WAVE HEATING OF NEUTRAL BEAM IONS AND EFFECTS ON MHD STABILITY: VALIDATION WITH EXPERIMENTS

Experimentally, during fast wave (FW) radio frequency (rf) heating in DIII‐D L‐mode discharges, strong acceleration of neutral beam (NB) deuterium beam ions has been observed. Significant effects on the n/m = 1/1 sawtooth stability are also seen. Simulations using the Monte‐Carlo Hamiltonian code ORBIT‐RF, coupled to the TORIC full wave code, predict beam ion tails up to a few hundred keV, in agreement with the experiment. The simulations and experiment both clearly show a much greater efficiency for 4th harmonic FW heating than for 8th harmonic heating. Simple analyses of the kinetic contribution to the ideal magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) potential energy from energetic beam ions generated by FW heating yields reasonable consistency with the observations. A more detailed analysis shows a more complicated picture, however. Other physics effects such as geometry, plasma rotation, and the presence of a free boundary, play a significant role.

Landau resonant modification of multiple kink mode contributions to 3D tokamak equilibria

Detailed measurements of the plasmas response to applied magnetic perturbations provide experimental evidence that the form of three-dimensional (3D) tokamak equilibria, with toroidal mode number n = 1, is determined by multiple stable kink modes at high-pressure. For pressures greater than the ideal magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) stability limit, as calculated without a stabilizing wall, the 3D structure transitions in a way that is qualitatively predicted by an extended MHD model that includes kinetic wave-particle interactions. These changes in poloidal mode structure are correlated with the proximity of rotation profiles to thermal ion bounce and the precession drift frequencies suggesting that these kinetic resonances are modifying the relative amplitudes of the stable modes. These results imply that each kink may eventually be independently controlled.

Stabilization of the vertical instability by non-axisymmetric coils

In a published Physical Review Letter [A. Reiman, Physical Review Letters, 99, 135007 (2007)], it was shown that axisymmetric (or vertical) stability can be improved by placing a set of parallelogram coils above and below the plasma oriented at an angle to the constant toroidal planes. The physics of this stabilization can be understood as providing an effective additional positive stability index. The original work was based on a simplified model of a straight tokamak and is not straightforwardly applicable to a finite aspect ratio, strongly shaped plasma such as in DIII-D. Numerical calculations were performed to provide a proof of principal that 3-D fields can, in fact raise the elongation limits as predicted, in a real DIII-D-like configuration. A four field period trapezoid-shaped coil set was developed in toroidal geometry and 3-D equilibria were computed using trapezium coil currents of ,10kA, 100kA, and 500kA. The ideal magnetohydrodynamics growth rates were computed as a function of the conformal wall position for the n=0 symmetry-preserving family. The results show an insignificant relative improvement in the stabilizing wall location for the two lower coil current cases, of the order of 10-3 and less. In contrast, the marginal wall position is increased bymorexa0» 7% as the coil current is increased to 500kA, confirming the main prediction from the original study in a real geometry case. In DIII-D the shift in marginal wall position of 7% would correspond to being able to move the existing wall outward by 5 to 10 cm. While the predicted effect on the axisymmetric stability is real, it appears to require higher coil currents than could be provided in an upgrade to existing facilities. Lastly, additional optimization over the pitch of the coils, the number of field periods and the coil positions, as well as plasma parameters, such as the internal inductivity liβ, and q95 would mitigate this but seem unlikely to change the conclusion.«xa0less

Effect of Energetic Trapped Particles Produced by ICRF Wave Heating on Sawtooth Instability in the DIII-D Tokamak

We evaluate the accuracy of the Porcelli sawtooth model using more realistic numerical models from the ORBIT‐RF and GATO codes in DIII‐D fast wave heating experiments. Simulation results confirm that the fast wave‐induced energetic trapped particles may stabilize the sawtooth instability. The crucial kinetic stabilizing contribution strongly depends on both the experimentally reconstructed magnetic shear at the qu2009=u20091 surface and the calculated poloidal beta of energetic trapped particles inside the qu2009=u20091 surface.