J.W. Connor A. Kirk H.R. Wilson
Edge Localised Modes (ELMs) are periodic disturbances of the plasma periphery occurring in tokamaks with an H-mode edge transport barrier. As a result, a fraction of the plasma energy present in the confined hot edge plasma is transferred to the open field lines in the divertor region, ultimately appearing at the divertor target plates. These event…
PublishedJ. W. Connor R. J. Hastie A. J. Webster
The destabilization of ideal magnetohydrodynamic ballooning modes at finite rotation shear is demonstrated for the model s - equilibrium by exploiting low magnetic shear, s , to simplify the two-dimensional stability problem to a one-dimensional eigenvalue problem. This simpler calculation captures the same features as exhibited by a full two-dimen…
PublishedP. Sandquist S. E. Sharapov P. Helander M. Lisak
A corrected relativistic collision operator is used to derive a Fokker-Planck equation for the distribution function of relativistic suprathermal electrons in a weakly relativistic plasma, which is then solved by a procedure similar to that employed in Connor and Hastie [Nucl. Fusion 15 , 415 (1975)]. Analytical expressions are derived for the elec…
PublishedF. L. Waelbroeck J.W. Connor H. R. Wilson
Gyrokinetic theory is used to investigate the effect of the polarization drift on magnetic island evolution. Three regimes are found. For island phase velocities between the ion- and electric-drift velocities, the polarization current is shown to be stabilizing. For phase velocities between the electric- and electron- drift velocities, the island e…
PublishedJ. B. Taylor J. W. Connor C. G. Gimblett H. R. Wilson R. J. Hastie
The resistive wall mode ~ RWM ! poses a threat to many plasma confinement devices. The continuous rotation of the wall relative to the plasma makes it appear perfectly conducting, because of the skin effect, but this is ineffective if the perturbation locks to the wall. This raises the question of whether a nonuniformly rotating wall is more effect…
PublishedJ. W. Connor F. L. Waelbroeck H. R. Wilson
The polarization current plays an important role in the evolution of magnetic islands with a width comparable to the characteristic ion orbit width. Understanding the evolution of such small magnetic islands is important for two reasons: (1) to investigate the threshold mechanisms for growth of large-scale islands (e.g., neoclassical tearing modes)…
PublishedA. Sykes R. J. Akers L. C. Appel P. G. Carolan J.W. Connor N. J. Conway G. F. Counsell A. Dnestrovskij Yu.N. Dnestrovskij M. Gryaznevich P. Helander M. P. S. Nightingale C. Ribeiro C. M. Roach M. Tournianski M. J. Walsh H. R. Wilson The S
H -mode operation has been achieved in high current I p . 200 kA plasmas in the START spherical tokamak for both neutral-beam-injection-heated and Ohmic discharges. The transition to H mode features the development of well-defined edge pedestals in density and temperature, which signifies the formation of an edge-transport barrier, and associated e…
PublishedJ. W. Connor R. J. Hastie
It has been suggested [Kleva and Guzdar, Phys. Plasmas 6 , 116 (1999)] that reconnecting ballooning modes in which electron inertia replaces resistivity in a nonideal magnetohydrodynamic Ohm’s law can have substantial growth rates in the low collisionality regime. Numerical calculation, albeit necessarily at unrealistically large values of the co…
PublishedH. R. Wilson J. W. Connor A. R. Field S. J. Fielding R. L. Miller et al.
The ideal magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) stability of the tokamak edge is analyzed, with particular emphasis on radially localized instabilities; it is proposed that these are responsible for edge pressure gradient limits and edge localized modes (ELMS). Data and stability calculations from DIII-D [to appear in Proceedings of the 16th International Conf…
Published