5,025 research outputs found
Structure of Micro-instabilities in Tokamak Plasmas: Stiff Transport or Plasma Eruptions?
Solutions to a model 2D eigenmode equation describing micro-instabilities in
tokamak plasmas are presented that demonstrate a sensitivity of the mode
structure and stability to plasma profiles. In narrow regions of parameter
space, with special plasma profiles, a maximally unstable mode is found that
balloons on the outboard side of the tokamak. This corresponds to the
conventional picture of a ballooning mode. However, for most profiles this mode
cannot exist and instead a more stable mode is found that balloons closer to
the top or bottom of the plasma. Good quantitative agreement with a 1D
ballooning analysis is found provided the constraints associated with higher
order profile effects, often neglected, are taken into account. A sudden
transition from this general mode to the more unstable ballooning mode can
occur for a critical flow shear, providing a candidate model for why some
experiments observe small plasma eruptions (Edge Localised Modes, or ELMs) in
place of large Type I ELMs.Comment: 11 pages, 3 figure
Using the local gyrokinetic code, GS2, to investigate global ITG modes in tokamaks. (I) s- model with profile and flow shear effects
This paper combines results from a local gyrokinetic code with analytical
theory to reconstruct the global eigenmode structure of the linearly unstable
ion-temperature-gradient (ITG) mode with adiabatic electrons. The simulations
presented here employ the s- tokamak equilibrium model. Local
gyrokinetic calculations, using GS2 have been performed over a range of radial
surfaces, x, and for ballooning phase angle, p, in the range -, to map out the complex local mode frequency, . Assuming a quadratic radial profile for the
drive, namely , (holding constant all other equilibrium
profiles such as safety factor, magnetic shear etc.), has a
stationary point. The reconstructed global mode then sits on the outboard mid
plane of the tokamak plasma, and is known as a conventional or isolated mode,
with global growth rate, ~ Max[], where
is the local growth rate. Taking the radial variation in
other equilibrium profiles (e.g safety factor q(x)) into account, removes the
stationary point in and results in a mode that peaks
slightly away from the outboard mid-plane with a reduced global growth rate.
Finally, the influence of flow shear has also been investigated through a
Doppler shift, , where n
is the toroidal mode number and incorporates the effect of
flow shear. The equilibrium profile variation introduces an asymmetry to the
growth rate spectrum with respect to the sign of ,
consistent with recent global gyrokinetic calculations.Comment: 10 pages, 8 figures and 1 tabl
Turbulent transport in tokamak plasmas with rotational shear
Nonlinear gyrokinetic simulations have been conducted to investigate
turbulent transport in tokamak plasmas with rotational shear. At sufficiently
large flow shears, linear instabilities are suppressed, but transiently growing
modes drive subcritical turbulence whose amplitude increases with flow shear.
This leads to a local minimum in the heat flux, indicating an optimal E x B
shear value for plasma confinement. Local maxima in the momentum fluxes are
also observed, allowing for the possibility of bifurcations in the E x B shear.
The sensitive dependence of heat flux on temperature gradient is relaxed for
large flow shear values, with the critical temperature gradient increasing at
lower flow shear values. The turbulent Prandtl number is found to be largely
independent of temperature and flow gradients, with a value close to unity.Comment: 4 pages, 5 figures, submitted to PR
Relaxation Design of Separable Tube Connectors
Design procedure to predict relaxation or time to leakage for separable tube connector
Zero-Turbulence Manifold in a Toroidal Plasma
Sheared toroidal flows can cause bifurcations to zero-turbulent-transport
states in tokamak plasmas. The maximum temperature gradients that can be
reached are limited by subcritical turbulence driven by the parallel velocity
gradient. Here it is shown that q/\epsilon (magnetic field pitch/inverse aspect
ratio) is a critical control parameter for sheared tokamak turbulence. By
reducing q/\epsilon, far higher temperature gradients can be achieved without
triggering turbulence, in some instances comparable to those found
experimentally in transport barriers. The zero-turbulence manifold is mapped
out, in the zero-magnetic-shear limit, over the parameter space (\gamma_E,
q/\epsilon, R/L_T), where \gamma_E is the perpendicular flow shear and R/L_T is
the normalised inverse temperature gradient scale. The extent to which it can
be constructed from linear theory is discussed.Comment: 5 Pages, 4 Figures, Submitted to PR
Transport Bifurcation in a Rotating Tokamak Plasma
The effect of flow shear on turbulent transport in tokamaks is studied
numerically in the experimentally relevant limit of zero magnetic shear. It is
found that the plasma is linearly stable for all non-zero flow shear values,
but that subcritical turbulence can be sustained nonlinearly at a wide range of
temperature gradients. Flow shear increases the nonlinear temperature gradient
threshold for turbulence but also increases the sensitivity of the heat flux to
changes in the temperature gradient, except over a small range near the
threshold where the sensitivity is decreased. A bifurcation in the equilibrium
gradients is found: for a given input of heat, it is possible, by varying the
applied torque, to trigger a transition to significantly higher temperature and
flow gradients.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, submitted to PR
Kinetic instabilities that limit {\beta} in the edge of a tokamak plasma: a picture of an H-mode pedestal
Plasma equilibria reconstructed from the Mega-Amp Spherical Tokamak (MAST)
have sufficient resolution to capture plasma evolution during the short period
between edge-localized modes (ELMs). Immediately after the ELM steep gradients
in pressure, P, and density, ne, form pedestals close to the separatrix, and
they then expand into the core. Local gyrokinetic analysis over the ELM cycle
reveals the dominant microinstabilities at perpendicular wavelengths of the
order of the ion Larmor radius. These are kinetic ballooning modes (KBMs) in
the pedestal and microtearing modes (MTMs) in the core close to the pedestal
top. The evolving growth rate spectra, supported by gyrokinetic analysis using
artificial local equilibrium scans, suggest a new physical picture for the
formation and arrest of this pedestal.Comment: Final version as it appeared in PRL (March 2012). Minor improvements
include: shortened abstract, and better colour table for figures. 4 pages, 6
figure
Stabilisation of short-wavelength instabilities by parallel-to-the-field shear in long-wavelength flows
Magnetised plasma turbulence can have a multiscale character: instabilities
driven by mean temperature gradients drive turbulence at the disparate scales
of the ion and the electron gyroradii. Simulations of multiscale turbulence,
using equations valid in the limit of infinite scale separation, reveal novel
cross-scale interaction mechanisms in these plasmas. In the case that both
long-wavelength (ion-gyroradius-scale) and short-wavelength
(electron-gyroradius-scale) linear instabilities are driven far from marginal
stability, we show that the short-wavelength instabilities are suppressed by
interactions with long-wavelength turbulence. The observed suppression is a
result of two effects: parallel-to-the-field-line shearing by the long
wavelength flows, and the modification of the
background density gradient by long-wavelength fluctuations. In contrast,
simulations of multiscale turbulence where instabilities at both scales are
driven near marginal stability demonstrate that when the long-wavelength
turbulence is sufficiently collisional and zonally dominated the effect of
cross-scale interaction can be parameterised solely in terms of the local
modifications to the mean density and temperature gradients. We discuss
physical arguments that qualitatively explain how a change in equilibrium drive
leads to the observed transition in the impact of the cross-scale interactions.Comment: 20 pages, 28 figure
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