Numerical simulation for the accelerator of the KSTAR neutral beam ion source.

Recent experiments with a prototype long-pulse, high-current ion source being developed for the neutral beam injection system of the Korea Superconducting Tokamak Advanced Research have shown that the accelerator grid assembly needs a further upgrade to achieve the final goal of 120keV/65A for the deuterium ion beam. The accelerator upgrade concept was determined theoretically by simulations using the IGUN code. The simulation study was focused on finding parameter sets that raise the optimum perveance as large as possible and reduce the beam divergence as low as possible. From the simulation results, it was concluded that it is possible to achieve this goal by sliming the plasma grid (G1), shortening the second gap (G2-G3), and adjusting the G2 voltage ratio.