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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 325 records · Page 18
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2013

Nonlinear dynamics of beta-induced Alfvén eigenmode in tokamak

The beta-induced Alfvén eigenmode (BAE) excited by energetic particles in toroidal plasmas is studied in the global gyrokinetic simulations. It is found that the nonlinear BAE dynamics depends on the deviation from the marginality. In the strongly driven case, the mode exhibits a bursting state with fast and repetitive chirping. The nonlinear saturation is determined by the thermal ion nonlinearity and has no clear dependence on the linear growth rate. In the weakly driven case, the mode reaches a nearly steady state with small frequency chirping. The nonlinear dynamics is dominated by the energetic particle nonlinearity. In both cases, the nonlinear intensity oscillation and frequency chirping are correlated with the evolution of the coherent structures in the energetic particle phase space. Due to the radial variation of the mode amplitude and the radially asymmetric guiding center dynamics, the wave-particle interaction in the toroidal geometry is much more complex than the conventional one-dimensional wave-particle interaction paradigm.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2013

Simulation of neoclassical transport with the continuum gyrokinetic code COGENT

The development of the continuum gyrokinetic code COGENT for edge plasma simulations is reported. The present version of the code models a nonlinear axisymmetric 4D (R, v∥, μ) gyrokinetic equation coupled to the long-wavelength limit of the gyro-Poisson equation. Here, R is the particle gyrocenter coordinate in the poloidal plane, and v∥ and μ are the guiding center velocity parallel to the magnetic field and the magnetic moment, respectively. The COGENT code utilizes a fourth-order finite-volume (conservative) discretization combined with arbitrary mapped multiblock grid technology (nearly field-aligned on blocks) to handle the complexity of tokamak divertor geometry with high accuracy. Furthermore, topics presented are the implementation of increasingly detailed model collision operators, and the results of neoclassical transport simulations including the effects of a strong radial electric field characteristic of a tokamak pedestal under H-mode conditions.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2013

Toroidal precession as a geometric phase

Toroidal precession is commonly understood as the orbit-averaged toroidal drift of guiding centers in axisymmetric and quasisymmetric configurations. We give a new, more natural description of precession as a geometric phase effect. In particular, we show that the precession angle arises as the holonomy of a guiding center's poloidal trajectory relative to a principal connection. The fact that this description is physically appropriate is borne out with new, manifestly coordinate-independent expressions for the precession angle that apply to all types of orbits in tokamaks and quasisymmetric stellarators alike. We then describe how these expressions may be fruitfully employed in numerical calculations of precession.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2013

Roles of poloidal rotation in the q = 1 high-order harmonic tearing modes in a tokamak plasma

Roles of poloidal rotation in stabilizing the m/n=1/1 kink-tearing mode and exciting its high-order harmonic tearing modes are numerically investigated by using a reduced magnetohydrodynamic model. It is found that the high-order harmonic tearing modes, such as m/n=2/2, m/n=3/3, or even much higher-m harmonics, can be destabilized so significantly by rotation shear as to be more unstable than or comparable to the m/n=1/1 mode. Moreover, the short wave-length Kelvin- Helmholtz (KH) instabilities can be excited in the large rotation shear regime. The scaling power laws of the linear growth rate for each harmonic mode in different rotation shear regimes are verified by the previous relevant theoretical results based on the non-constant-{psi} and constant-{psi} behavior categories in tearing modes. During the nonlinear evolution, the m/n=2/2 mode dominated phase first appears and then is followed by the m/n=1/1 mode dominated nonlinear phase instead. Afterward, some smaller sub-islands due to the high-order harmonics are produced in the large irregular m=1 crescent-shaped island, and then a coalescence process of turbulent island chains occurs before the decay phase.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2013

Nonlinear canonical gyrokinetic Vlasov equation and computation of the gyrocenter motion in tokamaks

The nonlinear canonical gyrokinetic Vlasov equation is obtained from the nonlinear noncanonical gyrokinetic theory using the property of the coordinate transform. In the linear approximation, it exactly recovers the previous linear canonical gyrokinetic equations derived by the Lie-transform perturbation method. The computation of the test particle gyrocenter motion in tokamaks with a large magnetic perturbation is presented and discussed. The numerical results indicate that the second-order gyrocenter Hamiltonian is important for the gyrocenter motion of the trapped electron in tokamaks with a large magnetic perturbation.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2013

Ion temperature gradient instability at sub-Larmor radius scales with non-zero ballooning angle

Linear gyro-kinetic stability calculations predict unstable toroidal ion temperature gradient modes (ITGs) with normalised poloidal wave vectors well above one (k{sub {theta}}{rho}{sub i}>1) for standard tokamak parameters with adiabatic electron response. These modes have a maximum amplitude at a poloidal angle {theta} that is shifted away from the low field side ({theta}{ne}0). The physical mechanism is clarified through the use of a fluid model. It is shown that the shift of the mode away from the low field side reduces the effective drift frequency which allows for the instability to develop. Numerical tests using the gyro-kinetic model confirm this physical mechanism. Furthermore, it is shown that modes localized away from the low field side can be important also for k{sub {theta}}{rho}{sub i}<1 close to the threshold of the ITG. In fact, modes with maximum amplitude at {theta}{ne}0 can exist for normalised temperature gradient lengths below the threshold of the ITG obtained for the case with the maximum at {theta}=0.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2013

Quick asymptotic expansion aided by a variational principle

It is shown how expanding asymptotically a variational functional can yield the asymptotic expansion of its Euler equation. The procedure is simple but novel and requires taking the variation of the expanded functional with respect to the leading order of the originally unknown function, even though the leading order of this function has already been determined in a previous order. An example is worked out that of a large aspect ratio tokamak plasma equilibrium state with relatively strong flows and high plasma beta.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2013

Comparing linear ion-temperature-gradient-driven mode stability of the National Compact Stellarator Experiment and a shaped tokamak

One metric for comparing confinement properties of different magnetic fusion energy configurations is the linear critical gradient of drift wave modes. The critical gradient scale length determines the ratio of the core to pedestal temperature when a plasma is limited to marginal stability in the plasma core. The gyrokinetic turbulence code GS2 was used to calculate critical temperature gradients for the linear, collisionless ion temperature gradient (ITG) mode in the National Compact Stellarator Experiment (NCSX) and a prototypical shaped tokamak, based on the profiles of a JET H-mode shot and the stronger shaping of ARIES-AT. While a concern was that the narrow cross section of NCSX at some toroidal locations would result in steep gradients that drive instabilities more easily, it is found that other stabilizing effects of the stellarator configuration offset this so that the normalized critical gradients for NCSX are competitive with or even better than for the tokamak. For the adiabatic ITG mode, NCSX and the tokamak had similar adiabatic ITG mode critical gradients, although beyond marginal stability, NCSX had larger growth rates. However, for the kinetic ITG mode, NCSX had a higher critical gradient and lower growth rates until a/L{sub T} Almost-Equal-To 1.5 a/L{sub T,crit}, when it surpassed the tokamak's. A discussion of the results presented with respect to a/L{sub T} vs. R/L{sub T} is included.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2013

The effect of emissive biased limiter on the magnetohydrodynamic modes in the IR-T1 tokamak

A moveable emissive biased limiter (EBL) for the investigation of spatial and temporal structure of MHD modes in IR-T1 tokamak, based on mirnov oscillations, was designed and constructed. The biasing has been considered to improve the global confinement by setting up an electric field at the plasma edge. Radial electric field (E{sub r}) modifies edge plasma turbulence, plasma rotation, and transport. Mirnov oscillations using singular value decomposition (SVD) and wavelet techniques were analyzed. SVD algorithm has been employed to analyze the frequency and wavenumber harmonics of the MHD fluctuations. The time-resolved frequency component analysis has been performed using wavelets. The EBL was applied to plasma at 10 ms with negative polarity. The results show that after applying EBL, the m = 2 mode is grown, m = 3 mode is suppressed, and H{sub {alpha}} radiation is decreased. Furthermore, results of the wavelet analysis of mirnov coil in the time range of 8-12 ms indicate that 1.5 ms after applying EBL, the MHD frequency is reduced from 45 kHz to 25 kHz.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2013

Identification and control of plasma vertical position using neural network in Damavand tokamak

In this work, a nonlinear model is introduced to determine the vertical position of the plasma column in Damavand tokamak. Using this model as a simulator, a nonlinear neural network controller has been designed. In the first stage, the electronic drive and sensory circuits of Damavand tokamak are modified. These circuits can control the vertical position of the plasma column inside the vacuum vessel. Since the vertical position of plasma is an unstable parameter, a direct closed loop system identification algorithm is performed. In the second stage, a nonlinear model is identified for plasma vertical position, based on the multilayer perceptron (MLP) neural network (NN) structure. Estimation of simulator parameters has been performed by back-propagation error algorithm using Levenberg-Marquardt gradient descent optimization technique. The model is verified through simulation of the whole closed loop system using both simulator and actual plant in similar conditions. As the final stage, a MLP neural network controller is designed for simulator model. In the last step, online training is performed to tune the controller parameters. Simulation results justify using of the NN controller for the actual plant.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗
DOE OSTI2013

Generalized shock conditions and the contact discontinuity in the Hall-magnetohydrodynamics model

It is shown that shocks and contact discontinuities in the Hall-magnetohydrodynamics (HMHD) model must satisfy solvability conditions that replace some of the familiar Rankine-Hugoniot jump conditions when the latter do not apply due to singular behavior of fluxes of conserved quantities. Some of these conditions depend on the larger topology of the plasma and magnetic field and are not merely 'local.' The contact discontinuity which separates two adjoining plasma regions or plasma and vacuum regions is the simplest case where the new jump conditions are applicable and is discussed for a toroidal plasma with sheared magnetic field such as the tokamak, but with no initial mass flow. It is proven that a static discontinuous tokamak-like equilibrium is linearly stable in the HMHD model if it is linearly stable within the ideal magnetohydrodynamics model, provided that the electron pressure depends only on the density, and some other restrictions on the ratio of pressure to density gradients also apply. When the electron pressure does depend on two thermodynamic variables, a sufficient condition for Hall-MHD plasma stability is derived as well.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2013

Lower hybrid instability driven by mono-energy {alpha}-particles with finite pitch angle spread in a plasma

A kinetic formalism of lower hybrid wave instability, driven by mono-energy {alpha}-particles with finite pitch angle spread, is developed. The instability arises through cyclotron resonance interaction with high cyclotron harmonics of {alpha}-particles. The {alpha}-particles produced in D-T fusion reactions have huge Larmor radii ({approx}10 cm) as compared to the wavelength of the lower hybrid wave, whereas their speed is an order of magnitude smaller than the speed of light in vacuum. As a result, large parallel phase velocity lower hybrid waves, suitable for current drive in tokamak, are driven unstable via coupling to high cyclotron harmonics. The growth rate decreases with increase in pitch angle spread of the beam. At typical electron density of {approx}10{sup 19} m{sup -3}, magnetic field {approx}4 Tesla and {alpha}-particle concentration {approx}0.1%, the large parallel phase velocity lower hybrid wave grows on the time scale of 20 ion cyclotron periods. The growth rate decreases with plasma density.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2013

Thermal ion effects on kinetic beta-induced Alfven eigenmodes excited by energetic ions

Kinetic beta-induced Alfven eigenmodes (KBAEs) driven by energetic ions are numerically investigated using revised AWECS code. The thermal ion density and temperature gradients are taken into account. It is found that the growth rate of the KBAEs increases with the thermal ion pressure gradient, and the contributions from the density gradient and temperature gradient of the thermal ions to the enhancement of the instability are comparable. The damping effect of thermal ion dynamics on the modes is also observed.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2013

Physics basis of Multi-Mode anomalous transport module

The derivation of Multi-Mode anomalous transport module version 8.1 (MMM8.1) is presented. The MMM8.1 module is advanced, relative to MMM7.1, by the inclusion of peeling modes, dependence of turbulence correlation length on flow shear, electromagnetic effects in the toroidal momentum diffusivity, and the option to compute poloidal momentum diffusivity. The MMM8.1 model includes a model for ion temperature gradient, trapped electron, kinetic ballooning, peeling, collisionless and collision dominated magnetohydrodynamics modes as well as model for electron temperature gradient modes, and a model for drift resistive inertial ballooning modes. In the derivation of the MMM8.1 module, effects of collisions, fast ion and impurity dilution, non-circular flux surfaces, finite beta, and Shafranov shift are included. The MMM8.1 is used to compute thermal, particle, toroidal, and poloidal angular momentum transports. The fluid approach which underlies the derivation of MMM8.1 is expected to reliably predict, on an energy transport time scale, the evolution of temperature, density, and momentum profiles in plasma discharges for a wide range of plasma conditions.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2013

Nonideal fishbone instability excited by trapped energetic electrons

It is shown that trapped energetic electrons can resonate with the collisionless m = 1 nonideal kink mode, therefore exciting the nonideal e-fishbone, which would often lead to a drop in soft x-ray emissivity and frequency chirping. The theory predictions agree well with the experimental observations of e-fishbone on HL-2A. It is also found that the effects of MHD energy of background plasma might be the reason for the observed phenomena: frequency chirping up and down, and V-font-style sweeping.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2013

The excitation of geodesic acoustic mode flows by a resonant magnetic field and by resonant heating

Toroidal magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) simulations demonstrate that sheared poloidal flows in tokamaks can be generated by the resonant excitation of the geodesic acoustic mode (GAM). Poloidal flows are generated by two resonant excitation methods: oscillating currents in an external coil and an oscillating heat source. The coil current and the heat source oscillate in time at the local GAM frequency. The sheared poloidal flow generated by the excitation of the GAM may be useful for the suppression of plasma instabilities.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2013

Poloidal flow damping inside transport barriers in a tokamak

The poloidal flow in a tokamak is damped by collisions. Thus, the poloidal damping can be described by the neoclassical theory. The effective poloidal Mach number, M{sub p}, can be of the order of one or higher inside transport barriers in a tokamak. It is found that the poloidal damping rate decreases exponentially as the effective poloidal Mach number increases. The poloidal damping rate is reduced by one order of magnitude in the presence of sonic M{sub p}. We also found that the ion plasma viscosity becomes negligible compared with the electron plasma viscosity when M{sub p}>1.5. In this case, the poloidal flow is damped by electron collisions rather than ion collisions.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2013

Verification of electromagnetic fluid-kinetic hybrid electron model in global gyrokinetic particle simulation

The fluid-kinetic hybrid electron model is verified in global gyrokinetic particle simulation of linear electromagnetic drift-Alfvenic instabilities in tokamak. In particular, we have recovered the {beta}-stabilization of the ion temperature gradient mode, transition to collisionless trapped electron mode, and the onset of kinetic ballooning mode as {beta}{sub e} (ratio of electron kinetic pressure to magnetic pressure) increases.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗