Observation of Persistent Edge Current Driven by Coaxial Helicity Injection (CHI)
Coaxial Helicity Injection, CHI, has been used on the National Spherical Torus Experiment (NSTX) [M. Ono et al., Nucl. Fusion 40 (2000) 557], the Helicity Injected Torus (HIT) [B.A. Nelson et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 72 (1994) 3666] and HIT-II [T.R. Jarboe et al., Phys. Plasmas 5 (1998) 1807] to initiate plasma and to drive up to 400 kA of toroidal current. On HIT-II, CHI initiated discharges have been successfully coupled to ohmic sustainment [R. Raman et al., Phys. Plasmas 11 (2004) 2565]. This paper presents the first results on the use of CHI to demonstrate the persistence of edge current drive in a preestablished single-null diverted inductive discharge. Edge current drive has the potential to improve plasma stability limits [J.E. Menard et al., Nucl. Fusion 37 (1997) 595]. While most current drive methods drive current in the interior of the plasma, CHI is well suited for driving current in the edge plasma.
- Research Organization:
- Princeton Plasma Physics Lab. (PPPL), Princeton, NJ (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE Office of Science (SC)
- DOE Contract Number:
- AC02-76CH03073
- OSTI ID:
- 839171
- Report Number(s):
- PPPL-4065; TRN: US0501630
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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