S. Ogasawara

Generation of high power sub-terahertz radiation from a gyrotron with second harmonic oscillation

New power records of second harmonic gyrotron oscillation have been demonstrated in the sub-THz band. The first step gyrotron of demountable type had succeeded in oscillation with power more than 50 kW at 350 GHz and nearly 40 kW at 390 GHz [T. Notake et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 103, 225002 (2009)]. Then, the second step gyrotron of sealed-off type was manufactured. A cavity mode was carefully selected to avoid mode competition with a neighboring fundamental harmonic mode. Matching of the selected mode with the electron gun was also circumspectly considered. The second step gyrotron has attained higher power radiation than the first gyrotron. The maximum single mode power was 62 kW at 388 GHz. Then, the electron gun was modified for use of a different cavity mode with a higher coupling coefficient than that for the 62 kW mode. The new mode proved single mode oscillation power of 83 kW at about 389 GHz. These results are new second-harmonic-oscillation power records for sub-THz gyrotrons. The present study constitutes foundations of development of high power second harmonic sub-THz gyrotron for application to collective Thomson scattering measurement on fusion plasmas, especially on high-density plasmas such as those produced in LHD [N. Ohyabu et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 97, 055002 (2006)]. This paper reports the design consideration to realize high power single mode gyrotron oscillation at second harmonic and the examination of oscillation characteristics of the gyrotron.

Development of terahertz gyrotrons and their application to CTS on LHD

Development of a high-power, sub terahertz pulse gyrotron has started in FIR FU for application to CTS on LHD. A new electron gun was designed to produce a laminar electron beam with a good quality. Second harmonic TE6,5 and TE8,5 modes were selected as oscillation modes well isolated from other competing modes. Single mode oscillation has been confirmed for both TE6,5 and TE8,5 modes. The maximum power is larger than 50 kW for TE6,5 mode (0.349 THz) and about 40 kW for TE8,5 mode (0.390 THz). These powers are new records of second harmonic gyrotron in this frequency range. Feasibility study of CTS with a 0.4 THz pulse gyrotron from a high density plasma in LHD was carried out. The CTS condition is satisfied for a wide operation regime and scattering angles large enough for good spatial resolution. Ray tracing calculation shows that the launched scattered beams are propagated almost straight. CTS spectra calculated with a newly developed code indicates that a large signal to noise ratio can be obtained against ECE for use of a 100 kW gyrotron.

Suppression of spurious mode oscillation in mega-watt 77-GHz gyrotron as a high quality probe beam source for the collective Thomson scattering in LHD.

Collective Thomson scattering (CTS) diagnostic requires a strong probing beam to diagnose a bulk and fast ion distribution function in fusion plasmas. A mega-watt gyrotron for electron cyclotron resonance heating is used as a probing beam in the large helical device. Spurious mode oscillations are often observed during the turning on/off phase of the modulation. The frequency spectra of the 77-GHz gyrotron output power have been measured, and then one of the spurious modes, which interferes with the CTS receiver system, is identified as the TE(17,6) mode at the frequency of 74.7 GHz. The mode competition calculation indicates that the increase of the magnetic field strength at the gyrotron resonator can avoid such a spurious mode and excite only the main TE(18,6) mode. The spurious radiation at the 74.7 GHz is experimentally demonstrated to be suppressed in the stronger magnetic field than that optimized for the high-power operation.

Electron Bernstein wave heating by electron cyclotron wave injection from the high-field side in LHD

In the Large Helical Device (LHD), evident electron Bernstein wave (EBW) heating was successfully performed. The experiment was carried out using the electron cyclotron heating (ECH) system that was upgraded by installation of high-power, long-pulse 77 GHz gyrotrons. The EBW heating was achieved by a mode conversion from injected EC wave to EBW, by the so-called slow-XB technique where an X-mode wave is injected to the plasma from the high magnetic field side. The specific magnetic configuration of LHD provides a good opportunity to realize the slow-XB technique, which is generally difficult for tokamaks. With the slow-XB technique, increases in kinetically evaluated electron energy Wpe and electron temperature Te were observed in overdense plasmas. An electron heating in the so-called super dense core plasma in LHD, which is characterized with an internal diffusion barrier and a steep density gradient at the plasma core, was successfully demonstrated in the plasma core region where the central electron density ne0 of 17 × 1019 m−3 was about 1.2 times higher, at the beginning of the EC-wave injection, than the left-hand cut-off density of applied 77 GHz EC waves.

Development of high power sub terahertz gyrotrons for application to CTS measurement

High power sub terahertz gyrotrons are under development in FIR-FU for application to CTS. Succeeding to more than 50 kW second harmonic oscillation power at 350 GHz with a demountable tube, a sealed-off gyrotron was newly fabricated and its performance test is now on going.

Scattering volume in the collective Thomson scattering measurement using high power gyrotron in the LHD

High-power gyrotrons prepared for the electron cyclotron heating at 77 GHz has been used for a collective Thomson scattering (CTS) study in LHD. Due to the difficulty in removing fundamental and/or second harmonic resonance in the viewing line of sight, the subtraction of the background ECE from measured signal was performed by modulating the probe beam power from a gyrotron. The separation of the scattering component from the background has been performed successfully taking into account the response time difference between both high-energy and bulk components. The other separation was attempted by fast scanning the viewing beam across the probing beam. It is found that the intensity of the scattered spectrum corresponding to the bulk and high energy components were almost proportional to the calculated scattering volume in the relatively low density region, while appreciable background scattered component remains even in the off volume in some high density cases. The ray-trace code TRAVIS is used to estimate the change in the scattering volume due to probing and receiving beam deflection effect.

Development of fast steering mirror control system for plasma heating and diagnostics

A control system for a fast steering mirror has been newly developed for the electron cyclotron heating (ECH) launchers in the large helical device. This system enables two-dimensional scan during a plasma discharge and provides a simple feedback control function. A board mounted with a field programmable gate array chip has been designed to realize feedback control of the ECH beam position to maintain higher electron temperature by ECH. The heating position is determined by a plasma diagnostic signal related to the electron temperature such as electron cyclotron emission and Thomson scattering.

Electron Bernstein wave heating and emission measurement through the very narrow O-X-B mode conversion window in the LHD

In the large helical device (LHD), the theoretically predicted width of the ordinary-extraordinary-electron Bernstein wave (O-X-B) mode conversion (MC) window is comparable to the beam width and the power deposition is located in the off-axis region if the 77GHz fundamental electron cyclotron (EC) wave of is launched from an existing horizontal port antenna. In the experiment, the actual MC window location was looked for with changing the aiming. The effective aiming with that the increase of the stored energy was observed was two degrees apart from the location of the theoretical MC window at a maximum. Measurement of the waves originated from the thermally emitted EBW and radiated via the B-X-O mode conversion process is effective to improve the accuracy of the theoretical prediction with comparison between the theoretical and the experimental results. The theoretical prediction suggests that the width of the MC window of the fundamental 77GHz EC wave can be expanded if the lower port antenna is used. O...

High Density Plasma Heating by EC-Waves Injected from the High-Field Side for Mode Conversion to Electron Bernstein Waves in LHD

To realize an excitation of electron Bernstein waves (EBW) via mode conversion from X-mode waves injected from the high magnetic field side (HFS), new inner-vessel mirrors were installed close to a helical coil in the large helical device (LHD). 77 GHz electron cyclotron (EC) wave beams injected from an existing EC-wave injection system toward the new mirror are reflected on the mirror so that the beams are injected to plasmas from HFS. Evident increases in the electron temperature at the plasma core region and the plasma stored energy were observed by the HFS beam injection to the plasmas with the line-average electron density of 7.5×1019 m−3, which is slightly higher than the plasma cut-off density of 77 GHz EC-waves, 7.35×1019 m−3. The heating efficiency evaluated from the changes in the time derivative of the plasma stored energy reached ~70%. Although so far it is not clear which is the main cause of the heating effect, the mode-converted EBW or the X-mode wave itself injected from the HFS, an effective heating of high-density plasma over the plasma cut-off of EC-wave was successfully demonstrated.

Generation of high power sub terahertz radiation from a gyrotron at second harmonic resonance

A high power sub terahertz pulse gyrotron is under development in FIR-FU for application to collective Thomson scattering from a high density plasma in the Large Helical Device. As a step to the final goal, a second harmonic gyrotron using a newly designed electron gun was fabricated aiming at 50 kW at around 400 GHz. Oscillation modes were carefully selected from the view point of mode separation. The electron optics was also considered in detail. Then, experiments have proved single mode oscillation of second harmonic modes and oscillation power of 50 kW at 349 GHz and 40 kW at 390 GHz.