Fully Kinetic Simulation of Ion-Temperature-Gradient Instabilities in Tokamaks Journal Article uri icon

Overview

abstract

  • The feasibility of using full ion kinetics, instead of gyrokinetics, in simulating low-frequency Ion-Temperature-Gradient (ITG) instabilities in tokamaks has recently been demonstrated. The present work extends the full ion kinetics to the nonlinear regime and investigates the nonlinear saturation of a single-n ITG instability due to the E × B trapping mechanism (n is the toroidal mode number). The saturation amplitude predicted by the E × B trapping theory is found to agree with the saturation level observed in the simulation. In extending to the nonlinear regime, we developed a toroidal Boris full orbit integrator, which proved to be accurate in capturing both the short-time scale cyclotron motion and long time scale drift motion, with good kinetic energy conservation and toroidal angular momentum conservation in tokamak equilibrium magnetic fields. This work also extends the previous work from analytic circular magnetic equilibria to general numerical magnetic equilibria, enabling simulation of realistic equilibria reconstructed from tokamak experiments.

publication date

  • May 31, 2018

has restriction

  • gold

Date in CU Experts

  • March 11, 2019 1:34 AM

Full Author List

  • Hu Y; Miecnikowski M; Chen Y; Parker S

author count

  • 4

published in

Other Profiles

Electronic International Standard Serial Number (EISSN)

  • 2571-6182

Additional Document Info

start page

  • 105

end page

  • 118

volume

  • 1

issue

  • 1