Injection of electrons with predominantly perpendicular energy into an area of toroidal field ripple in a tokamak plasma to improve plasma confinement

摘要

An electron injection scheme for controlling transport in a tokamak plasma. Electrons with predominantly perpendicular energy are injected into a ripple field region created by a group of localized poloidal field bending magnets. The trapped electrons then grad-B drift vertically toward the plasma interior until they are detrapped, charging the plasma negative. Calculations indicate that the highly perpendicular velocity electrons can remain stable against kinetic instabilities in the regime of interest for tokamak experiments. The penetration distance can be controlled by controlling the "ripple mirror ratio", the energy of the injected electrons, and their v.sub. /v.sub.51 ratio. In this scheme, the poloidal torque due to the injected radial current is taken by the magnets and not by the plasma. Injection is accomplished by the flat cathode containing an ECH cavity to pump electrons to high v.sub.. perp..