Development of Scientific Simulation 3D Full Wave ICRF Code for Stellarators and Heating/CD Scenarios Development

Technical Report · Mon Aug 15 00:00:00 EDT 2005

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/842635· OSTI ID:842635

Vdovin, V L

In this report we describe theory and 3D full wave code description for the wave excitation, propagation and absorption in 3-dimensional (3D) stellarator equilibrium high beta plasma in ion cyclotron frequency range (ICRF). This theory forms a basis for a 3D code creation, urgently needed for the ICRF heating scenarios development for the operated LHD, constructed W7-X, NCSX and projected CSX3 stellarators, as well for re evaluation of ICRF scenarios in operated tokamaks and in the ITER . The theory solves the 3D Maxwell-Vlasov antenna-plasma-conducting shell boundary value problem in the non-orthogonal flux coordinates ({Psi}, {theta}, {var_phi}), {Psi} being magnetic flux function, {theta} and {var_phi} being the poloidal and toroidal angles, respectively. All basic physics, like wave refraction, reflection and diffraction are self consistently included, along with the fundamental ion and ion minority cyclotron resonances, two ion hybrid resonance, electron Landau and TTMP absorption. Antenna reactive impedance and loading resistance are also calculated and urgently needed for an antenna -generator matching. This is accomplished in a real confining magnetic field being varying in a plasma major radius direction, in toroidal and poloidal directions, through making use of the hot dense plasma wave induced currents with account to the finite Larmor radius effects. We expand the solution in Fourier series over the toroidal ({var_phi}) and poloidal ({theta}) angles and solve resulting ordinary differential equations in a radial like {Psi}-coordinate by finite difference method. The constructed discretization scheme is divergent-free one, thus retaining the basic properties of original equations. The Fourier expansion over the angle coordinates has given to us the possibility to correctly construct the ''parallel'' wave number k{sub //}, and thereby to correctly describe the ICRF waves absorption by a hot plasma. The toroidal harmonics are tightly coupled with each other due to magnetic field inhomogeneity of stellarators in toroidal direction. This is drastically different from axial symmetric plasma of the tokamaks. The inclusion in the problem major radius variation of magnetic field can strongly modify earlier results obtained for the straight helical, especially for high beta plasma, due to location modification of the two ion hybrid resonance layers. For the NCSX, LHD, W7-AS and W7-X like magnetic field topology inclusion in our theory of a major radius inhomogeneity of the magnetic field is a key element for correct description of RF power deposition profiles at all. The theory is developed in a manner that includes tokamaks and magnetic mirrors as the particular cases through general metric tensor (provided by an equilibrium solver) treatment of the wave equations. We describe that newly developed stellarator ICRF 3D full wave code PSTELION, based on theory described in this report. Applications to tokamaks, ITER, stellarators and benchmarking with 2D TORIC and 3D AORSA codes are given in included subreports

• Research Organization: RRC Kurchatov Institute, Nuclear Fusion Institute
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Science (SC); Office of Fusion Sciences SC-55
• DOE Contract Number: FG02-02ER54667
• OSTI ID: 842635
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS
70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY
CYCLOTRON FREQUENCY
CYCLOTRON RESONANCE
DIFFERENTIAL EQUATIONS
FINITE DIFFERENCE METHOD
HEATING
HIGH-BETA PLASMA
HOT PLASMA
HYBRID RESONANCE
LARMOR RADIUS
MAGNETIC FIELDS
MAGNETIC FLUX
MAGNETIC MIRRORS
PLASMA WAVES
SIMULATION
STELLARATORS
WAVE EQUATIONS
Stellarator
tokamak
plasma heating
current drive
3D full wave ICRF modelling