Skip to main content
U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Conditioning of the graphite bumper limiter for enhanced confinement discharges in TFTR

Technical Report ·
DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/6197830· OSTI ID:6197830
A strong pumping effect has been observed with plasma operation on the toroidal graphite bumper limiter on TFTR. The pumping effect was induced by conditioning the limiter with a short series (10 to 20) of low density deuterium- or helium-initiated discharges. The density decay constant (tau/sub p/*) for gas-fueled ohmic discharges was reduced from tau/sub p/* > 10 s before conditioning to a minimum value of tau/sub p/* = 0.15 s after conditioning, corresponding to a reduction in the global recycling coefficient from approx.100% to less than 50%. Coincident with the low recycling conditions, low current neutral-beam-fueled discharges show global energy confinement times which are enhanced by a factor of two over results with an unconditioned limiter. Two models are proposed for the observed pumping effects: (1) a depletion model based on pumping of hydrogenic species in the near-surface region of the limiter after depletion of the normally saturated surface layer by (carbon and helium) ion-induced desorption; and (2) a codeposition model based on pumping of hydrogenic species in carbon films sputtered from the limiter by the conditioning process.
Research Organization:
Princeton Univ., NJ (USA). Plasma Physics Lab.
DOE Contract Number:
AC02-76CH03073
OSTI ID:
6197830
Report Number(s):
PPPL-2448; ON: DE87013199
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English