Recombination kinetics of impurities during a major disruption in tokamak plasmas

The investigations of major disruptions in the TVD and DAMAVAND tokamaks showed that, in the rapid phase of disruption, accelerated (～1 keV) ions and charge-exchange neutrals are generated near the rational magnetic surfaces; this is accompanied by the bursts of line emission from light impurities (C, O). In the present paper, an analysis is made of the bursts of the CV triplet emission (2271–2278 Å) observed over all of the viewing chords in high-current discharges and also of a decrease in the spectral line emission below its initial (predisruption) level both in the plasma core and at the plasma edge in low-current discharges. The data from measurements of the spatial and temporal parameters of the CV line emission from the central and peripheral plasma regions in the rapid phase of disruption in the DAMAVAND tokamak are compared to the results from model calculations of the kinetics of the charge-state distribution of carbon impurity ions (during the disruption, their kinetics is governed by the increase in the effective recombination rate). A key result of the kinetic model is an increase in the effective rate of charge exchange of impurity ions by two orders of magnitude. Numerical simulations show that the dispersion of the charge-state distribution increases substantially; this is attributed to the rapid phase of disruption being dominated by the recombination of impurity ions through charge exchange with neutrals rather than by the anomalous transport. In this case, carbon impurities in the plasma are transported to the region of increased radiative losses on a time scale of 50 μs.     

Development of the concept of charge-exchange recombination spectroscopy for ITER

Charge-exchange recombination spectroscopy under ITER conditions is numerically simulated using the DINA code. The code allows one to calculate the attenuation of neutral beams in plasma, the intensity of atomic emission and emission from the ions produced by charge exchange with the neutral beam, and the intensity ratio between the emission related to charge exchange and the background continuum plasma emission. The cross sections for atom-ion interactions in plasma are calculated, and the excitation rates of spectral transitions in hydrogen-like impurity ions are determined. The measurement scheme and the main parameters of the spectrometer proposed for charge-exchange recombination diagnostics in ITER are described.     

Spectroscopic measurements of the electron and ion temperatures and effective ion charge in current sheets formed in two- and three-dimensional magnetic configurations

The spatial distributions of the electron temperature and density, the effective and average ion charges, and the thermal and directed ion velocities in current sheets formed in two-dimensional magnetic fields and three-dimensional magnetic configurations with an X line were studied using spectroscopic and interference holographic methods. The main attention was paid to studying the time evolution of the intensities of spectral lines of the working-gas (argon) and impurity ions under different conditions. Using these data, the electron temperature was calculated with the help of an original mathematical code based on a collisional-radiative plasma model incorporating the processes of ionization and excitation, as well as MHD plasma flows generated in the stage of the current-sheet formation. It is shown that the electron temperature depends on the longitudinal magnetic field, whereas the ion temperature is independent of it. The effective ion charge of the current-sheet plasma was determined for the first time.     

Formation of charge-exchange ion flows near the exit from the stationary plasma thruster acceleration channel

Ion currents onto the exit plane of the acceleration channel of a stationary plasma thruster model were measured using electrostatic probes the collecting surfaces of which could be oriented either upstream or downstream with respect to the thruster plume. Using the results of measurements, the so-called “back” flows of charge-exchange ions onto the exit plane are estimated. It is shown that the back ion flows are the most intense in the close vicinity of the thruster, but do not exceed 0.6% of the total ion flow from the thruster. The formation of steady-state ion flows near the exit from the acceleration channel of a stationary plasma thruster is simulated numerically by using a three-dimensional kinetic model that describes the dynamics of ions and neutral atoms exhausting from the acceleration channel and produced in the thruster plume and takes into account resonance charge exchange of ions with neutral atoms. The distribution of the back ion current density in the exit plane is determined. The effect of the flow rate of the working gas through the cathode on the distributions of the neutral atom density and charge-exchange ion flows is demonstrated. The obtained results can be used to analyze the effect of the thruster plume on the charge state of the surfaces located in the vicinity of the thruster.     

Behaviors of impurity in ITER plasma with standard type I ELMy H-mode and steady-state scenarios

Self-consistent simulations of impurity behaviors in ITER plasmas in standard Type I ELMy H-mode and steady-state scenarios are investigated using 1.5D BALDUR integrated predictive modeling code. In these simulations, the plasma core transports, including electron and ion thermal, hydrogenic and impurity transports, are predicted using a linear combination of anomalous and neoclassical transports. An anomalous transport is calculated using a theory-based Multimode (MMM95) model; while the neoclassical transport is calculated using NCLASS model. The temperature and density boundary conditions are described at the top of the pedestal. Two different models for hydrogenic and impurity boundary density conditions are considered. The first model is called a “static boundary density model,” in which the hydrogenic and impurity densities at the boundary are fixed. For the second model, called a “dynamic boundary density model,” the hydrogenic and impurity densities at the boundary are assumed to be a large fraction of its line-averaged density. For simplicity, the pedestal temperature is assumed to be a constant in all simulations. The combination of a core transport model together with the boundary density models is used to simulate the time evolution of plasma current, temperature, and density profiles for ITER plasmas in standard type I ELMy H-mode and steady-state scenarios. As a result, the behaviors of impurity in ITER plasmas can be investigated. It is found in both ITER scenarios that the total amount of impurity, including beryllium and helium, in plasma core increases rapidly in early state and reaches a steady-state value. The level of impurity content in the steady state depends sensitively on the impurity boundary conditions. The effective charge at the edge is found to be about 1.4 and 1.1 using a static boundary density model and a dynamic boundary density model, respectively. It is also found that the hydrogenic and impurity transports in ITER plasmas for both scenarios is dominated by the kinetic ballooning modes, while the ITG and TEM modes provide the largest contributions for both thermal transports in most of region. In addition, a sensitivity study is carried out to investigate the impacts of pedestal temperature, pedestal density and line-averaged density on the impurity behaviors. It is found that increasing the pedestal temperature results in a reduction of the impurity content. On the other hand, increasing the pedestal density, line-averaged density or impurity influx result in an increase of the impurity content.     

Diagnostics of plasma produced by femtosecond laser pulse impact upon a target with an internal nanostructure

X-ray diagnostics of the interaction of femtosecond laser pulses with intensities of 10¹⁶–10¹⁸ W/cm² with CO₂ clusters and frozen nanosize water particles is carried out. The stage of cluster expansion and the formation of a plasma channel, which governs the parameters of the formed X-ray radiation source and accelerated ion flows, is studied. The measurements are based on recording spatially resolved X-ray spectra of H- and He-like oxygen ions. Utilization of Rydberg transitions for spectra diagnostics makes it possible to determine plasma parameters on a time scale of t ∼ 10 ps after the beginning of a femtosecond pulse. The role of the rear edge of the laser pulse in sustaining the plasma temperature at a level of ∼100 eV in the stage of a nonadiabatic cluster expansion is shown. The analysis of the profiles and relative intensities of spectral lines allows one to determine the temperature and density of plasma electrons and distinguish the populations of “thermal” ions and ions that are accelerated up to energies of a few tens of kiloelectronvolts. It is shown that the use of solid clusters made of frozen nanoscale water droplets as targets leads to a substantial increase in the number of fast He-like ions. In this case, however, the efficiency of acceleration of H-like ions does not increase, because the time of their ionization in plasma exceeds the time of cluster expansion.     

Spectroscopic measurements of the parameters of the helium plasma jets generated in the plasma focus discharge at the PF-3 facility

The spectroscopic technique used to measure the parameters of the plasma jets generated in the plasma focus discharge and those of the plasma of the immobile gas through which these jets propagate is described. The time evolution of the intensities and shapes of spectral lines in experiments carried out with helium at the PF-3 facility was studied by means of electron-optical streak cameras. The plasma electron temperature, T ≈ 4–5 eV, was determined from the intensity ratio of two spectral lines, one of which (λ₁ = 5876 Å) belongs to neutral helium, while the other (λ₂ = 4686 Å), to hydrogen-like helium ions. The plasma density at different time instants was determined from the Stark broadening of these lines in the electric fields of different nature. The plasma density is found to vary from 4 × 10¹⁴ to 2 × 10¹⁷ cm^?3.     

Emission spectroscopy diagnostics of rare gases in the PNX-U facility

Results are presented from measurements of the electron temperature and neutral atom density in a low-temperature microwave plasma by the method of emission spectroscopy. The measurements were conducted in the PNX-U facility—a magnetic confinement system with a “magnetic wall.” Multichord measurements of plasma radiation at a wavelength of 750.37 nm were performed with the help of an absolutely calibrated monochromator. The neutral atom density was calculated using the collisional-radiative model. The degree of plasma ionization near the axis of the facility was found to be close to unity. The electron temperature of the argon plasma was measured from the relative intensities of the spectral lines of neutral helium injected in small amounts into the plasma (the so-called helium thermometer method). At a low microwave heating power, the results of these measurements agree well with the results of probe measurements.     

Nonmonotonic Spatial Distributions of Charge-Exchange Neutral Fluxes and Optical Radiation from Plasma in the DAMAVAND Tokamak

Results are presented from investigations of the nonmonotonic spatial distributions of charge-exchange neutral fluxes and optical radiation from plasma in the DAMAVAND tokamak. It is shown that, during ohmic heating of the plasma, the regions with enhanced confinement of both the background plasma particles and heavy impurity ions arise near rational magnetic surfaces with q = 1 and 2. These regions are characterized by enhanced emission of accelerated charge-exchange neutrals and optical radiation from impurity ions.     

Impacts of pellets injected from the low-field side on plasma in ITER

Impacts of pellets injected from the low-field side (LFS) on plasma in ITER are investigated using the 1.5D BALDUR integrated predictive modeling code. In these simulations, the pellet ablation is described using the neutral gas shielding (NGS) model. The pellet ablation model is coupled with the plasma core transport model, which is a combination of the MMM95 anomalous transport model and NCLASS neoclassical transport model. The boundary conditions are assumed to be at the top of the pedestal, in which the pedestal parameters are predicted using a pedestal model based on the theoretical-based pedestal width scaling (either magnetic and flow shear stabilization width scaling, or flow shear stabilization width scaling, or normalized poloidal pressure width scaling) and the infinite-n ballooning mode pressure gradient limit. These pedestal models depend sensitively on the density at the top of the pedestal, which can be strongly influenced by the injection of pellets. The combination of the MMM95 and NCLASS models, together with the pedestal and NGS models, is used to simulate the time evolution of the plasma current, ion and electron temperatures, and density profiles for ITER standard type-I ELMy H-mode discharges during the injection of LFS pellets. It is found that the injection of pellets results in a complicated plasma scenario, especially in the outer region of the plasma and the plasma conditions at the boundary in which the pellet has an impact on increasing the plasma edge density, but reducing the plasma edge temperature. The LFS pellet has a stronger impact on the edge as compared to the center. For fusion performance, the pellet can result in either enhancement or degradation, depending sensitively on the pellet parameters; such as the pellet size, pellet velocity, and pellet frequency. For example, when a series of deuterium pellets with a size of 0.5 cm, velocity of 1 km/s, and frequency of 2 Hz are injected into the ITER plasma from the LFS, the plasma performance, evaluated in terms of Q _fusion, can increase to 72% of that before the use of pellets. It is also found that the injection of pellets results in an increase in the ion and electron densities, but does not enhance the central plasma density. On the other hand, it results in the formation of another peak of the plasma density in the outer region near the plasma edge. The formation of the density peak results in the reduction of plasma transports near the edge by decreasing the contributions of ion-temperature-gradient and trapped electron modes, as well as kinetic ballooning modes.     

Laser acceleration of light ions from a thin homogeneous foil of complex atomic composition

A model of the acceleration of light impurity particles from a plane ultrathin foil of complex ion composition by a high-power ultrashort high-contrast laser pulse is proposed. A study is made of both purely Coulomb ion acceleration, typical of extremely high electron energies, and ion acceleration under the conditions of space charge separation, determined by the finite typical electron temperature. Exact and approximate analytic approaches to describing impurity particle acceleration are developed. The spatial and spectral parameters of accelerated light particles are obtained, and their dynamics is investigated as a function of their relative charge density in a model of test impurity particles and in a model in which their own electrostatic field is taken into account. Optimum conditions for the generation of quasi-monoenergetic ions are discussed, depending on the laser radiation parameters and target composition.     

Pellet injection into H-mode ITER plasma with the presence of internal transport barriers

The impacts of pellet injection into ITER type-1 ELMy H-mode plasma with the presence of internal transport barriers (ITBs) are investigated using self-consistent core-edge simulations of 1.5D BALDUR integrated predictive modeling code. In these simulations, the plasma core transport is predicted using a combination of a semi-empirical Mixed B/gB anomalous transport model, which can self-consistently predict the formation of ITBs, and the NCLASS neoclassical model. For simplicity, it is assumed that toroidal velocity for ω _E×B calculation is proportional to local ion temperature. In addition, the boundary conditions are predicted using the pedestal temperature model based on magnetic and flow shear stabilization width scaling; while the density of each plasma species, including both hydrogenic and impurity species, at the boundary are assumed to be a large fraction of its line averaged density. For the pellet’s behaviors in the hot plasma, the Neutral Gas Shielding (NGS) model by Milora-Foster is used. It was found that the injection of pellet could result in further improvement of fusion performance from that of the formation of ITB. However, the impact of pellet injection is quite complicated. It is also found that the pellets cannot penetrate into a deep core of the plasma. The injection of the pellet results in a formation of density peak in the region close to the plasma edge. The injection of pellet can result in an improved nuclear fusion performance depending on the properties of pellet (i.e., increase up to 5% with a speed of 1 km/s and radius of 2 mm). A sensitivity analysis is carried out to determine the impact of pellet parameters, which are: the pellet radius, the pellet velocity, and the frequency of injection. The increase in the pellet radius and frequency were found to greatly improve the performance and effectiveness of fuelling. However, changing the velocity is observed to exert small impact.     

Improvement of plasma energy confinement in tokamak under radiative cooling of the edge plasma

Improvement of plasma energy confinement in the T-10 tokamak by injection of impurity gases was studied experimentally. Injection of Ne and He in the ohmic and ECR heating regimes allows one to separate the dependences of energy confinement on the plasma density and on the edge plasma cooling rate. It is shown that the well-known dependence of the energy confinement time on the plasma density is, in fact, the dependence on the radiative loss power. This phenomenon can be explained by plasma self-organization. The experiments are described by a thermodynamic model for self-organized plasma in which the transport coefficient depends on the difference between the actual and self-consistent pressure profiles. The reduction in the heat flux at the plasma edge due to radiative cooling leads to a decrease in the transport coefficient in this region and, accordingly, improves energy confinement. Results of approximate model calculations for experiments with Ne injection are presented.     

Acceleration of impurity ions in the coulomb explosion of a relativistic spherical cluster with a complex ion composition

A semi-analytical model of the acceleration of light impurity ions to relativistic energies in the Coulomb explosion of a spherically symmetric homogeneous microtarget (cluster) consisting of ions of two types has been proposed. The spatiotemporal and spectral characteristics of accelerated impurity ions, which have a quasi-monochromatic spectrum, have been determined. The properties of high-energy impurity ions have been studied as functions of the total charge of the cluster and its ion composition.     

Heat exchange in dusty plasma

The effect of the charge of a dust grain on the exchange of its heat with plasma particles and with neutral gas particles in an anisotropic dusty plasma with dissipative flows is discussed. It is shown, in particular, that nonuniform heating of the grain surface gives rise to the radiometric force, which may be stronger than the ion wind force. Also, the grain charge causes the thermophoretic force to change its sign.     

生物体发育过程中细胞膜电位变化与衰老

维持一定的跨质膜电势,关乎到细胞内外物质交换的基本代谢能否顺利进行,因此是所有细胞生存的前提。这是生物的单细胞祖先发展出的有效生存手段,当进化到多细胞生物体后却遇到麻烦。多细胞生物为细胞营群居生活,在物理导体的静电荷分布规律的支配下,个体细胞所携外正内负的净电荷有向细胞集团边缘汇集的趋势,导致多数细胞失去本身所携净电荷,不能维持正常跨膜电势,从而逐渐失去活力。这可能就是多细胞生物衰老的根本原因。衰老是生物体在发育中随细胞数量增多不可避免的自然发生的效应。有证据显示以上描述的电荷分布变化过程的假说是真实存在。植物体中细胞所携电荷的汇集,以及随之发生的带电离子从高浓度区向低浓度区的扩散流失,可导致产生有趣的植物生电的现象,例如大树发电。对植物电压、电的极性、高密度电荷位点分布的测结果与此假说理论完全吻合。     

Impurity radiation from a tokamak plasma

In tokamak operating modes, energy balance is often governed by impurity radiation. This is the case near the divertor plates, during impurity pellet injection, during controlled discharge disruptions, etc. The calculation of impurity radiation is a fairly involved task (it is sometimes the most difficult part of the general problem) because the radiation power is determined by the distribution of ions over the excited states and by the rate constants of elementary processes of radiation and absorption. The objective of this paper is to summarize in one place all the approximate formulas that would help investigators to describe radiation from the most often encountered impurities in a fairly simple way in their calculations accounting for plasma radiation, without reference to special literature. Simple approximating formulas describing ionization, recombination, and charge-exchange processes, as well as radiative losses from ions with a given charge, are presented for five impurity species: beryllium, carbon, oxygen, neon, and argon. Estimating formulas that allow one to take into account plasma opacity for resonant photons in line impurity radiation are also presented.     

Kinetics of impurity charge-state distributions in tokamak plasmas

An analysis of impurity behavior in tokamak plasmas with the use of the observation results on impurity emission shows that it is necessary to distinguish between the ion dynamics (for example, ion transport) and ion kinetics, i.e., the processes related to the motion of ions on the charge states and/or excited states due to atomic processes in plasma. This paper presents a systematic analysis of the kinetics of impurity chargestate distributions and the related effects, as well as their typical scales and conditions for their observation. The quantitative analysis is performed in terms of the lowest moments of charge-state distributions such as the average charge m and dispersion D. Analytic approaches to solving charge-state kinetic equations are considered. An approach based on the symmetry properties of the kinetic matrix is proposed for the first time. The simplest types of impurity charge-state kinetics and the most important limiting cases are considered. A detailed analysis of the nonstationary behavior of the function of the moments D(m) of the charge-state distribution is presented. A quantitative analysis of the available experimental and model charge-state distributions of C, O, Ne, and Ar impurities in the JET, DIII-D, TORE SUPRA, ALCATOR-C, TEXTOR, PLT, TFR, and DAMAVAND tokamaks is performed in terms of the moments D(m). It is shown that the moments D(m)of the model charge-state distributions of the above impurities in the plasma core are essentially insensitive to the empirical diffusion coefficient. The equivalent curves D(m) obtained for the plasma periphery can be attributed to the convective fluxes of ionizing and/or recombining impurity ions.     

Formation of a narrow radial density profile of fast ions in the GDT device

The radial density profile of fast ions with a mean energy of 10 keV is measured in experiments with a two-component high-β plasma in the GDT device. Fast ions are produced by injecting neutral beams into a warm plasma. The measured fast-ion density profile is found to be narrower than that calculated with allowance for the neutral beam trapping and Coulomb scattering. Special experiments with a movable limiter have indicated that the formation of a narrow fast-ion density profile in GDT cannot be attributed to the loss of fast ions. Possible mechanisms responsible for this effect are discussed.     

X-ray spatial distribution of a low-inductance vacuum spark discharge

The paper presents the results of X-ray source spatial distribution measurements of a low-inductance vacuum spark discharge based on the analysis of helium-like ions spectral lines structure. The intensities of spectral lines of FeXXV ions and dielectronic satellites with spatial resolution were measured. The polarization of satellite line 1s2p ^{2 2} D _5/2-1s ²2p ² P _3/2 was found. The obtained dependence of maximum plasma parameters during micropinch events from initial plasma line density in discharge corresponds to the radiative collapse model.