Impact of Edge Current Density and Pressure Gradient on the Stability of DIII-D High Performance Discharges

Download or read book Impact of Edge Current Density and Pressure Gradient on the Stability of DIII-D High Performance Discharges written by and published by . This book was released on 1997 with total page 7 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 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.