A near X-point charge exchange neutral spectroscopy (CENS) system for DIII-D.

A 16 channel spectroscopy system has been installed on DIII-D to provide information about the energy distribution of the atomic neutrals using the Doppler shift and broadening of passive Balmer-α emission. The lines of sight are dominantly in the toroidal direction, with tangencies near the lowest point on closed magnetic flux surfaces moving from the lower divertor upward into the confined plasma. This allows the system to provide details of the neutrals as they undergo various atomic physics processes while traveling upward from the lower divertor.

Broadening of the Divertor Heat Flux Profile in High Confinement Tokamak Fusion Plasmas with Edge Pedestals Limited by Turbulence in DIII-D.

Multimachine empirical scaling predicts an extremely narrow heat exhaust layer in future high magnetic field tokamaks, producing high power densities that require mitigation. In the experiments presented, the width of this exhaust layer is nearly doubled using actuators to increase turbulent transport in the plasma edge. This is achieved in low collisionality, high confinement edge pedestals with their gradients limited by turbulent transport instead of large-scale, coherent instabilities.

Aligning the Thomson scattering and charge exchange recombination diagnostics using neutral beam emission at DIII-D.

This work addresses discrepancies in the alignment of the H-mode pedestal profiles of the electron and ion properties in the DIII-D tokamak as measured by Thomson Scattering (TS) and Charge Exchange Recombination Spectroscopy (CER) diagnostics. While the alignment of these profiles is key for accurate studies of tokamak physics and plasma confinement, misalignments can occur due to inaccuracies, such as in magnetic equilibrium reconstructions required to map measurements in different poloidal and toroidal locations. Both FIDASIM, an established simulation package, and a simplified collisional radiative model are used to simulate neutral beam state densities and neutral beam emission.

Turbulence characteristics and flow dynamics impacts on the H-mode transition in favourable magnetic geometry with lower power threshold.

The L-H transition power threshold () in favourable magnetic geometry (ion ∇ drift pointing towards X-point) is much lower than in the unfavourable magnetic geometry (ion ∇ drift pointing away from X-point) on multiple tokamaks. In a systematic experiment on DIII-D, the ion ∇ drift direction was changed continuously from the unfavourable to favourable configuration during plasma discharges. During such process, the input neutral beam power was kept constant at a value that was above for favourable configuration, but lower than for unfavourable configuration.

Details of the neutral energy distribution and ionization source using spectrally resolved Balmer-alpha measurements on DIII-D.

Spectrally resolved passive Balmer-α (D-α, H-α) measurements from the DIII-D 16 channel edge main-ion charge exchange recombination system confirm the presence of higher energy neutrals ("thermal" neutrals) in addition to the cold neutrals that recycle off the walls in the edge region of DIII-D plasmas. Charge exchange between thermal ions and edge neutrals transfers energy and momentum between the populations giving rise to thermal neutrals with energies approximating the ions in the pedestal region. Multiple charge exchange events in succession allow an electron to effectively take a random walk, transferring from ion to ion, providing a pathway of increasing energy and velocity, permitting a neutral to get deeper into the plasma before a final ionization event that contributes to the ion and electron particle fueling.