Development and Application of Predictive Tools for MHD Stability Limits in Tokamaks

Technical Report · Mon Oct 03 00:00:00 EDT 2016

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/1327543· OSTI ID:1327543

Brennan, Dylan ^[1]; Miller, G. P. ^[2]

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1. Princeton Univ., NJ (United States)
2. Univ. of Tulsa, Tulsa, AZ (United States)

This is a project to develop and apply analytic and computational tools to answer physics questions relevant to the onset of non-ideal magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) instabilities in toroidal magnetic confinement plasmas. The focused goal of the research is to develop predictive tools for these instabilities, including an inner layer solution algorithm, a resistive wall with control coils, and energetic particle effects. The production phase compares studies of instabilities in such systems using analytic techniques, PEST- III and NIMROD. Two important physics puzzles are targeted as guiding thrusts for the analyses. The first is to form an accurate description of the physics determining whether the resistive wall mode or a tearing mode will appear first as β is increased at low rotation and low error fields in DIII-D. The second is to understand the physical mechanism behind recent NIMROD results indicating strong damping and stabilization from energetic particle effects on linear resistive modes. The work seeks to develop a highly relevant predictive tool for ITER, advance the theoretical description of this physics in general, and analyze these instabilities in experiments such as ASDEX Upgrade, DIII-D, JET, JT-60U and NTSX. The awardee on this grant is the University of Tulsa. The research efforts are supervised principally by Dr. Brennan. Support is included for two graduate students, and a strong collaboration with Dr. John M. Finn of LANL. The work includes several ongoing collaborations with General Atomics, PPPL, and the NIMROD team, among others.

• Research Organization: Univ. of Tulsa, Tulsa, AZ (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Science (SC), Fusion Energy Sciences (FES)
• DOE Contract Number: SC0004125
• OSTI ID: 1327543
• Report Number(s): 1; TRN: US1700309
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY
TEARING INSTABILITY
DOUBLET-3 DEVICE
ELECTRIC COILS
ASDEX TOKAMAK
ITER TOKAMAK
JT-60U TOKAMAK
COMPARATIVE EVALUATIONS
ALGORITHMS
WALLS
MATHEMATICAL SOLUTIONS
CONTROL
DAMPING
JET TOKAMAK
PLASMA MACROINSTABILITIES
STABILIZATION
Fusion Energy
Magnetohydrodynamic Stability and Control
Energetic Particles