Understanding core tungsten (W) transport and control in an improved high-performance fully non-inductive discharge on EAST
Shengyu Shi, Jiale Chen, C. Bourdelle, Xiang Jian, T. Odstrčil, A. M. Garofalo, Yunxin Cheng, Yan Chao, Ling Zhang, Yanmin Duan, Muquan Wu, Fang Ding, Yingying Li, Juan Huang, Jinping Qian, Xiang Gao, Yuanxi Wan
Abstract
Abstract The behavior of heavy/high- Z impurity tungsten (W) in an improved high-performance fully non-inductive discharge on EAST with ITER-like divertor (ILD) is analyzed. It is found that W could be well controlled. The causes of no W accumulation are clarified by analyzing the background plasma parameters and modeling the W transport. It turns out that the electron temperature ( T e ) and its gradient are usually high while the toroidal rotation and density peaking of the bulk plasma are small. In this condition, the modeled W turbulent diffusion coefficient is big enough to offset the total turbulent and neoclassical pinch, so that W density profile for zero particle flux will not be very peaked. Combining NEO and TGLF for the W transport coefficient and the impurity transport code STRAHL, not only the core W density profile is predicted but also the radiated information mainly produced by W in the experiment can be closely reconstructed. At last, the physics of controlling W accumulation by electron cyclotron resonance heating (ECRH) is illustrated considering the effects of changed T e by ECRH on ionization balance and transport of W. It shows that the change of ionization and recombination balance by changed T e is not enough to explain the experimental observation of W behavior, which should be attributed to the changed W transport. By comparing the W transport coefficients in two kinds of plasmas with different T e profiles, it is shown that high T e and its gradient play a key role to generate large turbulent diffusion through increasing the growth rate of linear instability so that W accumulation is prevented.