1,274 research outputs found
Flux surface shaping effects on tokamak edge turbulence and flows
Shaping of magnetic flux surfaces is found to have a strong impact on
turbulence and transport in tokamak edge plasmas. A series of axisymmetric
equilibria with varying elongation and triangularity, and a divertor
configuration are implemented into a computational gyrofluid turbulence model.
The mechanisms of shaping effects on turbulence and flows are identified.
Transport is mainly reduced by local magnetic shearing and an enhancement of
zonal shear flows induced by elongation and X-point shaping.Comment: 10 pages, 11 figures. Submitted to Physics of Plasma
Towards a unified linear kinetic transport model with the trace ion module for EIRENE
Linear kinetic Monte Carlo particle transport models are frequently employed
in fusion plasma simulations to quantify atomic and surface effects on the main
plasma flow dynamics. Separate codes are used for transport of neutral
particles (incl. radiation) and charged particles (trace impurity ions).
Integration of both modules into main plasma fluid solvers provides then self
consistent solutions, in principle. The required interfaces are far from
trivial, because rapid atomic processes in particular in the edge region of
fusion plasmas require either smoothing and resampling, or frequent transfer of
particles from one into the other Monte Carlo code. We propose a different
scheme here, in which despite the inherently different mathematical form of
kinetic equations for ions and neutrals (e.g. Fokker-Planck vs. Boltzmann
collision integrals) both types of particle orbits can be integrated into one
single code. We show that the approximations and shortcomings of this "single
sourcing" concept (e.g., restriction to explicit ion drift orbit integration)
can be fully tolerable in a wide range of typical fusion edge plasma
conditions, and be overcompensated by the code-system simplicity, as well as by
inherently ensured consistency in geometry (one single numerical grid only) and
(the common) atomic and surface process modulesComment: 15 pages, 7 figure
Plasma turbulence simulations with X-points using the flux-coordinate independent approach
In this work, the Flux-Coordinate Independent (FCI) approach to plasma
turbulence simulations is formulated for the case of generic, static magnetic
fields, including those possessing stochastic field lines. It is then
demonstrated that FCI is applicable to nonlinear turbulent problems with and
without X-point geometry. In particular, by means of simulations with the
FENICIA code, it is shown that the standard features of ITG modes are recovered
with reduced toroidal resolution. Finally, ITG turbulence under the influence
of a static island is studied on the transport timescale with ITER-like
parameters, showing the wide range of applicability of the method
Nonlinear gyrofluid computation of edge localised ideal ballooning modes
Three dimensional electromagnetic gyrofluid simulations of the ideal
ballooning mode blowout scenario for tokamak edge localized modes (ELMs) are
presented. Special emphasis is placed on energetic diagnosis, examining changes
in the growth rate in the linear, overshoot, and decay phases. The saturation
process is energy transfer to self generated edge turbulence which exhibits an
ion temperature gradient (ITG) mode structure. Convergence in the decay phase
is found only if the spectrum reaches the ion gyroradius. The equilibrium is a
self consistent background whose evolution is taken into account. Approximately
two thirds of the total energy in the edge layer is liberated in the blowout.
Parameter dependence with respect to plasma pressure and the ion gyroradius is
studied. Despite the violent nature of the short-lived process, the transition
to nonlinearity is very similar to that found in generic tokamak edge
turbulence.Comment: The following article has been submitted to Physics of Plasmas. After
it is published, it will be found at http://pop.aip.org
Magnetohydrodynamic normal mode analysis of plasma with equilibrium pressure anisotropy
In this work, we generalise linear magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) stability theory
to include equilibrium pressure anisotropy in the fluid part of the analysis. A
novel 'single-adiabatic' (SA) fluid closure is presented which is complementary
to the usual 'double-adiabatic' (CGL) model and has the advantage of naturally
reproducing exactly the MHD spectrum in the isotropic limit. As with MHD and
CGL, the SA model neglects the anisotropic perturbed pressure and thus loses
non-local fast-particle stabilisation present in the kinetic approach. Another
interesting aspect of this new approach is that the stabilising terms appear
naturally as separate viscous corrections leaving the isotropic SA closure
unchanged. After verifying the self-consistency of the SA model, we re-derive
the projected linear MHD set of equations required for stability analysis of
tokamaks in the MISHKA code. The cylindrical wave equation is derived
analytically as done previously in the spectral theory of MHD and clear
predictions are made for the modification to fast-magnetosonic and slow ion
sound speeds due to equilibrium anisotropy.Comment: 19 pages. This is an author-created, un-copyedited version of an
article submitted for publication in Plasma Physics and Controlled Fusion.
IOP Publishing Ltd is not responsible for any errors or omissions in this
version of the manuscript or any version derived from i
Energetic Consistency and Momentum Conservation in the Gyrokinetic Description of Tokamak Plasmas
Gyrokinetic field theory is addressed in the context of a general
Hamiltonian. The background magnetic geometry is static and axisymmetric, and
all dependence of the Lagrangian upon dynamical variables is in the Hamiltonian
or in free field terms. Equations for the fields are given by functional
derivatives. The symmetry through the Hamiltonian with time and toroidal angle
invariance of the geometry lead to energy and toroidal momentum conservation.
In various levels of ordering against fluctuation amplitude, energetic
consistency is exact. The role of this in underpinning of conservation laws is
emphasised. Local transport equations for the vorticity, toroidal momentum, and
energy are derived. In particular, the momentum equation is shown for any form
of Hamiltonian to be well behaved and to relax to its magnetohydrodynamic (MHD)
form when long wavelength approximations are taken in the Hamiltonian. Several
currently used forms, those which form the basis of most global simulations,
are shown to be well defined within the gyrokinetic field theory and energetic
consistency.Comment: RevTeX 4, 47 pages, no figures, revised version updated following
referee comments (discussion more strictly correct/consistent, 4 references
added, results unchanged as they depend on consistency of the theory),
resubmitted to Physics of Plasma
A Drift-Kinetic Analytical Model for SOL Plasma Dynamics at Arbitrary Collisionality
A drift-kinetic model to describe the plasma dynamics in the scrape-off layer
region of tokamak devices at arbitrary collisionality is derived. Our
formulation is based on a gyroaveraged Lagrangian description of the charged
particle motion, and the corresponding drift-kinetic Boltzmann equation that
includes a full Coulomb collision operator. Using a Hermite-Laguerre velocity
space decomposition of the gyroaveraged distribution function, a set of
equations to evolve the coefficients of the expansion is presented. By
evaluating explicitly the moments of the Coulomb collision operator,
distribution functions arbitrarily far from equilibrium can be studied at
arbitrary collisionalities. A fluid closure in the high-collisionality limit is
presented, and the corresponding fluid equations are compared with
previously-derived fluid models
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Diagnostics for magnetically confined high-temperature plasmas
During the last 20 years, magnetically confined laboratory plasmas of steadily increasing temperatures and densities have been obtained, most notably in tokamak configurations, and now approach the conditions necessary to sustain a fusion reaction. Even more important to the goal of understanding the physics of such systems, remarkable advances in plasma diagnostics, the techniques for determining the properties of such plasmas, have accompanied these developments. More parameters can be determined with greater accuracy and finer spatial and temporal resolution. The magnetic configuration, the primary local thermodynamic quantities (density, temperature, and drift velocity), and other necessary quantities can now be measured with sufficient accuracy to determine particle and energy fluxes within the plasma and to characterize the basic transport processes. These plasmas are far from thermodynamic equilibrium. This deviation manifests itself in a variety of instabilities on several spatial and temporal scales, many of which are aptly described as turbulence. Many aspects of the turbulence can also be characterized. This article reviews the current state of diagnostics from an epistemoiogical perspective: the capabilities and limitations for measuring each important physical quantity are presented.Physic
ORB5: a global electromagnetic gyrokinetic code using the PIC approach in toroidal geometry
This paper presents the current state of the global gyrokinetic code ORB5 as
an update of the previous reference [Jolliet et al., Comp. Phys. Commun. 177
409 (2007)]. The ORB5 code solves the electromagnetic Vlasov-Maxwell system of
equations using a PIC scheme and also includes collisions and strong flows. The
code assumes multiple gyrokinetic ion species at all wavelengths for the
polarization density and drift-kinetic electrons. Variants of the physical
model can be selected for electrons such as assuming an adiabatic response or a
``hybrid'' model in which passing electrons are assumed adiabatic and trapped
electrons are drift-kinetic. A Fourier filter as well as various control
variates and noise reduction techniques enable simulations with good
signal-to-noise ratios at a limited numerical cost. They are completed with
different momentum and zonal flow-conserving heat sources allowing for
temperature-gradient and flux-driven simulations. The code, which runs on both
CPUs and GPUs, is well benchmarked against other similar codes and analytical
predictions, and shows good scalability up to thousands of nodes
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