Impact of edge current density and pressure gradient on the stability of DIII-D high performance discharges

Conference · Sun Jun 01 04:00:00 EDT 1997

OSTI ID:516025

Lao, L L; Ferron, J R; Strait, E J ^[1]

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1. and others

One of the major goals of advanced tokamak research is to develop plasma configurations with good confinement and improved stability at high {beta}. In DIII-D, various high performance configurations with H- and VH-mode edges have been produced. These include discharges with poloidal cross sections in the forms of dee and crecent shapes, single- and double-null divertors, and with various central magnetic shear profiles and current profile peakedness. All these discharges exhibit confinement in the outer plasma region which leads to a large edge pressure gradient and a large edge bootstrap current driven by this steep pressure gradient. These edge conditions often drive an instability near the edge region which can severely degrade the discharge performance. An understanding of this edge instability is essential to sustain an enhance discharge performance.

• Research Organization: General Atomics, San Diego, CA (United States); Oak Ridge National Lab., TN (United States); Columbia Univ., New York, NY (United States); Lawrence Livermore National Lab., CA (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Energy Research, Washington, DC (United States)
• DOE Contract Number: AC03-89ER51114; AC05-96OR22464; FG02-89ER53297; W-7405-ENG-48
• OSTI ID: 516025
• Report Number(s): GA--A22640; CONF-9706131--11; ON: DE97007895
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY
BOOTSTRAP CURRENT
DOUBLET-3 DEVICE
H-MODE PLASMA CONFINEMENT
NON-INDUCTIVE CURRENT DRIVE
PERFORMANCE
PLASMA INSTABILITY
PRESSURE GRADIENTS