Tonghui Shi

Nonlinear Transition from Mitigation to Suppression of the Edge Localized Mode with Resonant Magnetic Perturbations in the EAST Tokamak

Evidence of a nonlinear transition from mitigation to suppression of the edge localized mode (ELM) by using resonant magnetic perturbations (RMPs) in the EAST tokamak is presented. This is the first demonstration of ELM suppression with RMPs in slowly rotating plasmas with dominant radio-frequency wave heating. Changes of edge magnetic topology after the transition are indicated by a gradual phase shift in the plasma response field from a linear magneto hydro dynamics modeling result to a vacuum one and a sudden increase of three-dimensional particle flux to the divertor. The transition threshold depends on the spectrum of RMPs and plasma rotation as well as perturbation amplitude. This means that edge topological changes resulting from nonlinear plasma response plays a key role in the suppression of ELM with RMPs.

Excitation of (2,1) neoclassical tearing modes by mode coupling with (1,1) internal mode in EAST

Neoclassical tearing modes (NTM) are observed in discharges with auxiliary heating LH+ICRF and LH only during H-mode in EAST. The m/n?=?2/1 NTM is triggered by strongly coupling with an m/n?=?1/1 internal mode. Here, LH and ICRF are the abbreviations of lower hybrid resonance heating and ion cyclotron resonance frequency heating, respectively. The mode number of the NTM is m/n?=?2/1, where m is the poloidal mode number and n is the toroidal mode number. Just before the triggering of NTMs, an m/n?=?1/1 internal mode appears in the soft x-ray emission at plasma centre when the intensity of hard x-ray (IHX) reaches a critical value. The mode, characterized by frequency chirping in the spectrum, may be related to suprathermal electrons produced by LH. The saturated magnetic island width wsat of the NTM is strongly correlated with poloidal ?p. Normalized ?N,onset and the magnetic island critical width wcrit increase with electron temperature Te.

Observations of pressure gradient driven m = 1 internal kink mode in EAST tokamak

Pressure gradient driven m = 1 internal kink mode destabilization that follows an L-H transition is observed in the operational region of the EAST tokamak, which manifests in periodic oscillations in soft x-ray (SXR) and Mirnov coil signals. Using tomography with the high resolution soft x-ray detection array, we find that the rotation direction of the 1/1 kink mode is in the ion diamagnetic drift direction in poloidal cross-section. A large displacement of the hot core is attributable to the shift of the 1/1 internal kink mode. In contrast to stationary oscillations with fixed frequency, various frequency chirping behavior is observed with this 1/1 kink mode. Furthermore, we also occasionally observe that a 2/1 neoclassical tearing mode (NTM) is triggered by a 1/1 internal kink mode via mode coupling in a high-performance plasma. The spatial structure of a 2/2 mode, which is the harmonic mode of the 1/1 kink mode, is also presented in this paper. Large amounts of medium-Z impurities accumulate in the cen...

Experimental observation of beta-induced Alfvén eigenmodes during strong tearing modes on the EAST tokamak in fast-electron plasmas

Beta-induced Alfv?n eigenmodes (BAEs) during strong tearing modes are investigated on the EAST tokamak systematically, and the relation between the BAE frequencies and plasma parameters such as electron density , ion temperature Ti, the profile of safety factor q(?) or the intensity of (the width of the magnetic island w) is given in detail during the injection of the power of lower hybrid wave (LHW) (or is also accompanied by the injection of ion cyclotron resonance frequency) comprehensively. All the conditions show that the values of BAE frequencies are in agreement with the generalized fishbone-like dispersion relation, and the activities of the BAEs have a strong interaction with the process of magnetic reconnection.The BAEs are formed during the injection of the power of LHW, and disappear immediately when the power of LHW is turned off on the EAST tokamak. The LHW plasmas or the runaway discharge in Ohmic plasmas can increase the population of fast electrons, which plays a role in the activities of BAEs and a possible excitation mechanism for the BAEs during the strong tearing mode activities.

Observation of pedestal turbulence in edge localized mode-free H-mode on experimental advanced superconducting tokamak

Two different pedestal turbulence structures have been observed in edge localized mode-free phase of H-mode heated by lower hybrid wave and RF wave in ion cyclotron range of frequencies (ICRF) on experimental advanced superconducting tokamak. When the fraction of ICRF power PICRF/Ptotal exceeds 0.7, coherent mode is observed. The mode is identified as an electromagnetic mode, rotating in electron diamagnetic direction with a frequency around 50 kHz and toroidal mode number n = −3. Whereas when PICRF/Ptotal is less than 0.7, harmonic mode with frequency f = 40–300 kHz appears instead. The characteristics of these two modes are demonstrated preliminarily. The threshold value of heating power and also the plasma parameters are distinct.

Edge localized mode control using n = 1 resonant magnetic perturbation in the EAST tokamak

A set of in-vessel resonant magnetic perturbation (RMP) coil has been recently installed in EAST. It can generate a range of spectrum, and there is a relatively large window for edge localized mode (ELM) control according to the vacuum field modeling of the edge magnetic island overlapping area. Observation of mitigation and suppression of ELM in slow rotating plasmas during the application of an n = 1 RMP is presented in this paper. Strong ELM mitigation effect is observed in neutral beam injection heating plasmas. The ELM frequency increases by a factor of 5, and the crash amplitude and the particle flux are effectively reduced by a similar factor. Clear density pump-out and magnetic braking effects are observed during the application of RMP. Footprint splitting is observed during ELM mitigation and agrees well with vacuum field modelling. Strong ELM mitigation happens after a second sudden drop of plasma density, which indicates the possible effect due to field penetration of the resonant harmonics near the pedestal top, where the electron perpendicular rotation becomes flat and close to zero after the application of RMP. ELM suppression is achieved in a resonant window during the scan of the n = 1 RMP spectrum in radio-frequency (RF) dominant heating plasmas. The best spectrum for ELM suppression is consistent with the resonant peak of RMP by taking into account of linear magnetohydrodynamics plasma response. There is no mode locking during the application of n = 1 RMP in ELMy H-mode plasmas, although the maximal coil current is applied.

Density limits investigation and high density operation in EAST tokamak

Increasing the density in a tokamak is limited by the so-called density limit, which is generally performed as an appearance of disruption causing loss of plasma confinement, or a degradation of high confinement mode which could further lead to a H → L transition. The L-mode and H-mode density limit has been investigated in EAST tokamak. Experimental results suggest that density limits could be triggered by either edge cooling or excessive central radiation. The L-mode density limit disruption is generally triggered by edge cooling, which leads to the current profile shrinkage and then destabilizes a 2/1 tearing mode, ultimately resulting in a disruption. The L-mode density limit scaling agrees well with the Greenwald limit in EAST. The observed H-mode density limit in EAST is an operational-space limit with a value of . High density H-mode heated by neutral beam injection (NBI) and lower hybrid current drive (LHCD) are analyzed, respectively. The constancy of the edge density gradients in H-mode indicates a critical limit caused perhaps by e.g. ballooning induced transport. The maximum density is accessed at the H → L transition which is generally caused by the excessive core radiation due to high Z impurities (Fe, Cu). Operating at a high density () is favorable for suppressing the beam shine through NBI. High density H-mode up to could be sustained by 2 MW 4.6 GHz LHCD alone, and its current drive efficiency is studied. Statistics show that good control of impurities and recycling facilitate high density operation. With careful control of these factors, high density up to 0.93 stable H-mode operation was carried out heated by 1.7 MW LHCD and 1.9 MW ion cyclotron resonance heating with supersonic molecular beam injection fueling.

Erratum: New Steady-State Quiescent High-Confinement Plasma in an Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak [Phys. Rev. Lett. 114, 055001 (2015)].

In our recently published work, there is an error in the stated direction of the edge coherent MHDmode (ECM) associated with real-time Li injection. This error does not affect the main results of the paper. The direction of the ECMwas obtained from two high sampling-frequencyMirnov magnetic pickup probes. In the Letter, we reported that the ECM propagates in the ion diamagnetic drift direction. The ECM actually propagates in the electron diamagnetic drift direction, consistent with the identified direction in our previous study [1].

Snake perturbation during pellet injection in the EAST tokamak

The pellet-induced snake oscillation was observed by soft x-ray (SXR) diagnostic in EAST for the first time after a fueling-sized pellet penetrated the q = 1 surface. The snake phenomenon has a long lifetime with a helicity of m = 1 and n = 1. Basic behaviors of the snake, including the triggering condition, interaction with the sawtooth and snake rotation frequency, were discussed in detail by multiple core diagnostics. The snake location was also analyzed through observation of the vertical SXR arrays and raw SXR brightness profiles. It is clear that the snake resided in a broad region between the magnetic axis and the q = 1 surface derived from equilibrium reconstruction. This investigation is beneficial for the understanding of the snake formation for EAST and future devices, like ITER and DEMO.

The dynamics of a neoclassical tearing mode (NTM) influenced by energetic ions on EAST

In the 2014 years campaign of experimental advanced superconducting tokamak (EAST), a series of Magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) instabilities were observed as the launching of Neutral Beam Injection (NBI), the most interesting one of which is the neoclassical tearing mode (NTM). Evidence clearly shows that a kink mode present after a strong sawtooth-like (ST-like) crash leaves a perturbation near the location of the magnetic island, providing the initial seed. The interaction of energetic ions makes the magnetic island oscillate both in island width and in rotation frequency. Analysis indicates that the bulk plasma still dominates the dynamics of NTM, and the orbit excursion of energetic ions induces a polarization current and modifies the width and rotation frequency of the neoclassical magnetic island.