Real-time plasma equilibrium reconstruction and shape control for the MAST Upgrade tokamak
H. Anand, W Wehner, D. Eldon, A.S. Welander, Z. Xing, A. Lvovskiy, J.L. Barr, Eunjung Cho, B. Sammuli, D.A. Humphreys, N.W. Eidietis, A.W. Leonard, M. Kochan, C. Vincent, G. McArdle, G. Cunningham, A. Thornton, J. Harrison, V. Soukhanovskii, J. Lovell
Abstract
Abstract Real-time magnetic control has been developed to deliver precise control of multiple plasma shape parameters for advanced divertor configurations, including double-null, Super-X, X-point target and X-divertor for the first time on the MAST Upgrade (MAST-U) spherical tokamak. Successful real-time magnetic equilibrium control of different plasma shape variables has been accomplished in the 2022–2023 MAST-U experimental campaign for the advanced MAST-U divertor configurations. Application of the MAST-U boundary reconstruction algorithm, LEMUR, is described and compared with off-line equilibrium reconstruction and diagnostic measurements. The process of design and verification of the axisymmetric magnetic control schemes using a suite of control analysis tools (known collectively as TokSys) is also described.