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At least 145 records · Page 8

3D ion gyro-orbit heat load predictions for NSTX-U

Abstract High power tokamaks operate with divertor heat loads capable of destroying the plasma facing components (PFCs). High fidelity heat load predictions are necessary to ascertain the PFC state for design and during operation. Typical heat flux calculations are 2D, time invariant, and assume that power flows directly along the magnetic field lines (the optical approximation). These assumptions neglect the complex 3D geometries employed to protect the PFCs, the time varying nature of the plasma and PFC thermal state, and the helical trajectories of ions with finite Larmor radii (the gyro-orbit approximation). An integrated software framework, the heat flux engineering analysis toolkit (HEAT), was developed to generate time varying optical heat loads applied to real engineering computer aided design (CAD) (Looby et al 2022 Fusion Sci. Technol. 78 10–27). Recently, an ion-gyro orbit module has been added to HEAT. This module calculates the helical trajectories of ions as they gyrate about the magnetic field lines using kinetic theory macro-particles to accelerate the calculation. First, the new gyro-orbit module will be presented. Next, a comparison to existing research is performed. Finally, an analysis of the gyro-orbit heat loads for NSTX-U is presented for diverted discharges using the engineering CAD models utilized for PFC fabrication. Including these gyro-orbit effects can enhance the PFC performance by ‘smearing’ out the magnetic shadows associated with the castellated fish-scaled geometry. Simultaneously, the helical trajectories can degrade performance when they load narrow regions on edges and corners with high heat fluxes. Analysis of the trade-offs between these competing effects is included, and regions for further investigation are identified.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

ELM sputter erosion modeling of a tungsten coated small angle slot divertor in DIII-D

We modeled plasma edge localized mode (ELM) sputter erosion for a Small Angle Slot divertor with a tungsten coated region (SAS-VW), designed for experiments in the DIII-D tokamak, and proposed for use in future advanced tokamaks. The simulations use a free-streaming, 1000 eV, C +6 and D +1 ELM impingement model, with SOLPS-ITER, ITMC-DYN, and REDEP/WBC code packages for background plasma, material response, and erosion/redeposition respectively. The results show ELM'ing plasma gross and net tungsten erosion fluxes of the mixed-material C/W surface peaking at the slot entrance region, and an order of magnitude higher than for non-ELMs. The per-pulse erosion, however, remains low, of order 0.5 nm, due to expected moderate ELM frequencies and duration in DIII-D. Here, the ELMs result in a ~25x higher peak sputtered W current leaving the divertor slot region, towards the core plasma, compared to the ELM-free plasma case. The time-integrated escape current, however, may not significantly affect core plasma high-Z contamination concerns, for a 1% ELM duty factor, but may be an issue for higher frequency ELMs. In general, the modeling results appear favorable for effective testing of the SAS-VW divertor in DIII-D, and extrapolation to innovative divertor designs in future ITER-like and DEMO fusion devices.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

Development of Integrated Education, Training and Research Program with Interdisciplinary Applications

Plasma models have been formulated including realistic spatial profiles of both flow and radio frequency induced ponderomotive force. With these inclusions the picture of stability of various plasma and fluid instabilities, as expected, changed drastically with ground-breaking consequences. The inhomogeneous parallel flow and the radio frequency waves can actually shown to stabilize turbulence. This is different from the prevalent notion that both parallel flow shear and radio frequency waves are responsible for the excitation (destabilization) of plasma turbulence. This has several ground-breaking consequences:- (1) the stabilization by parallel flow clearly goes against the conventional notion of the origin of ionospheric oscillation which invokes parallel flow destabilization as the origin, (2) the stabilization by parallel flow opens us a new avenue for improved mode formation in fusion devices - which mostly rely on the perpendicular flow shear stabilization for improved mode formation but the perpendicular flow is damped in a tokamak - so the improved mode formed by the parallel flow can sustain longer and has more prospect for ignition, (3) the complete stabilization of the ITG mode (and consequent suppression of transport) not only explain many unknown phenomena in the space physics but it also raises a prospect for transport barrier formation by the RF waves but not by the RF induced flow (as most works suggest) which is never observed in a tokamak of that magnitude to create a barrier. These are indeed ground-breaking consequences.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

Enabling integrated AI control on DIII-D: a control system design with state-of-the-art experiments

We present the design and application of a general algorithm for Prediction And Control using MAchiNe learning (PACMAN) in DIII-D. Machine learning (ML)-based predictors and controllers have shown great promise in achieving regimes in which traditional controllers fail, such as tearing mode (TM) free scenarios, ELM-free scenarios and stable advanced tokamak conditions. The architecture presented here was deployed on DIII-D to facilitate the end-to-end implementation of advanced control experiments, from diagnostic processing to final actuation commands. This paper describes the detailed design of the algorithm and explains the motivation behind each design point. We also describe several successful ML control experiments in DIII-D using this algorithm, including a reinforcement learning controller targeting advanced non-inductive plasmas, a wide-pedestal quiescent H-mode ELM predictor, an Alfvén Eigenmode controller, a Model Predictive Control plasma profile controller and a state-machine TM predictor-controller. There is also discussion on guiding principles for real-time ML controller design and implementation.

machine learning↗

Development of Integrated Education, Training and Research Program with Interdisciplinary Applications II

Plasma models have been formulated including realistic spatial profiles of both flow and radio frequency induced ponderomotive force. With these inclusions the picture of stability of various plasma and fluid instabilities, as expected, changed drastically with ground-breaking consequences. The inhomogeneous parallel flow and the radio frequency waves can actually shown to stabilize turbulence. This is different from the prevalent notion that both parallel flow shear and radio frequency waves are responsible for the excitation (destabilization) of plasma turbulence. This has several ground-breaking consequences:- (1) the stabilization by parallel flow clearly goes against the conventional notion of the origin of ionospheric oscillation which invokes parallel flow destabilization as the origin, (2) the stabilization by parallel flow opens us a new avenue for improved mode formation in fusion devices - which mostly rely on the perpendicular flow shear stabilization for improved mode formation but the perpendicular flow is damped in a tokamak - so the improved mode formed by the parallel flow can sustain longer and has more prospect for ignition, (3) the complete stabilization of the ITG mode (and consequent suppression of transport) not only explain many unknown phenomena in the space physics but it also raises a prospect for transport barrier formation by the RF waves but not by the RF induced flow (as most works suggest) which is never observed in a tokamak of that magnitude to create a barrier. These are indeed ground-breaking consequences.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

A subgrid model for electron-scale turbulent transport in global ion-scale gyrokinetic simulations of tokamak plasmas

A subgrid electron–temperature–gradient (ETG) model is demonstrated here which averages local electron-scale turbulence over intermediate scales in space and time to include in global ion–temperature–gradient (ITG) simulations. This approach results in ion-scale equations, which incorporate the electron heat transport from ETG turbulence and the effects of electron-scale turbulence on the ion scale. Flux-tube ETG Cyclone Base Case simulations are performed at different radial locations and a kinetic form of the flux is added to global ion-scale (IS) simulations as a source term. Analytic radial profiles of ETG heat flux are constructed and compared to flux-tube results at multiple radial locations. Different ratios of ITG to ETG heat flux levels are considered and the results of capturing ETG heat transport in global ion-scale simulations are discussed. The potential coupling of the ETG streamer potential and intermediate-scale zonal flows to the ion scale is further addressed.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

Toward continuum gyrokinetic study of high-field mirrors

High-temperature superconducting (HTS) magnetic mirrors under development exploit strong fields with high mirror ratio to compress loss cones and enhance confinement and may offer cheaper, more compact fusion power plant candidates. This new class of devices could exhibit largely unexplored interchange and gradient-driven modes. Such instabilities, and methods to stabilize them, can be studied with gyrokinetics, given the strong magnetization and prevalence of kinetic effects. Our focus here is to (a) determine if oft-used gyrokinetic models for open field lines produce the electron-confining (Pastukhov) electrostatic potential and (b) examine and address challenges faced by gyrokinetic codes in studying HTS mirrors. Here, we show that a one-dimensional limit of said models self-consistently develops a potential qualitatively approaching the analytical Pastukhov level. Additionally, we describe the computational challenges of studying high mirror ratios with open field line gyrokinetic solvers and offer a force softening method to mitigate small time steps needed for time integration in colossal magnetic field gradients produced by HTS coils, providing a 19X speedup.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

Hermes-3: Multi-component plasma simulations with BOUT++

A new open source tool for fluid simulation of multi-component plasmas is presented, based on a flexible software design that is applicable to scientific simulations in a wide range of fields. Hermes-3 is built on plasma simulation framework BOUT++, consolidating earlier SD1D and Hermes models into a single code that can be configured at run-time to solve plasma models in 1D, 2D or 3D, either for transport (steady-state) or turbulent (time-evolving) problems, with an arbitrary number of ion and neutral species. Here, we describe the improved numerical algorithms and software design that have been implemented in Hermes-3. To demonstrate the capabilities of this tool, applications relevant to the boundary of tokamak plasmas are presented: 1D simulations of diveror plasmas evolving equations for all charge states of neon and deuterium; 2D transport simulations of tokamak equilibria in single-null X-point geometry with plasma ion and neutral atom species; and simulations of the time-dependent propagation of plasma filaments (blobs). Hermes-3 is publicly available on Github under the GPL-3 open source license. The repository includes documentation and a suite of unit, integrated and convergence tests.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

Latent space mapping: Revolutionizing predictive models for divertor plasma detachment control

The inherent complexity of boundary plasma, characterized by multi-scale and multi-physics challenges, has historically restricted high-fidelity simulations to scientific research due to their intensive computational demands. Consequently, routine applications such as discharge control and scenario development have relied on faster but less accurate empirical methods. This work introduces DivControlNN, a novel machine-learning-based surrogate model designed to address these limitations by enabling quasi-real-time predictions (i.e., ~ 0.2 ms) of boundary and divertor plasma behavior. Trained on over 70,000 2D UEDGE simulations from KSTAR tokamak equilibria, DivControlNN employs latent space mapping to efficiently represent complex divertor plasma states, achieving a computational speed-up of over 10 8 compared to traditional simulations while maintaining a relative error below 20% for key plasma property predictions. During the 2024 KSTAR experimental campaign, a prototype detachment control system powered by DivControlNN successfully demonstrated detachment control on its first attempt, even for a new tungsten divertor configuration and without any fine-tuning. These results highlight the transformative potential of DivControlNN in overcoming diagnostic challenges in future fusion reactors by providing fast, robust, and reliable predictions for advanced integrated control systems.

Artificial neural networks↗

Progress from ASDEX Upgrade experiments in preparing the physics basis of ITER operation and DEMO scenario development

An overview of recent results obtained at the tokamak ASDEX Upgrade (AUG) is given. A work flow for predictive profile modelling of AUG discharges was established which is able to reproduce experimental H-mode plasma profiles based on engineering parameters only. In the plasma center, theoretical predictions on plasma current redistribution by a dynamo effect were confirmed experimentally. For core transport, the stabilizing effect of fast ion distributions on turbulent transport is shown to be important to explain the core isotope effect and improves the description of hollow low-Z impurity profiles. The L–H power threshold of hydrogen plasmas is not affected by small helium admixtures and it increases continuously from the deuterium to the hydrogen level when the hydrogen concentration is raised from 0 to 100%. One focus of recent campaigns was the search for a fusion relevant integrated plasma scenario without large edge localised modes (ELMs). Results from six different ELM-free confinement regimes are compared with respect to reactor relevance: ELM suppression by magnetic perturbation coils could be attributed to toroidally asymmetric turbulent fluctuations in the vicinity of the separatrix. Stable improved confinement mode plasma phases with a detached inner divertor were obtained using a feedback control of the plasma β. The enhanced D α H-mode regime was extended to higher heating power by feedback controlled radiative cooling with argon. The quasi-coherent exhaust regime was developed into an integrated scenario at high heating power and energy confinement, with a detached divertor and without large ELMs. Small ELMs close to the separatrix lead to peeling-ballooning stability and quasi continuous power exhaust. Helium beam density fluctuation measurements confirm that transport close to the separatrix is important to achieve the different ELM-free regimes. Based on separatrix plasma parameters and interchange-drift-Alfvén turbulence, an analytic model was derived that reproduces the experimentally found important operational boundaries of the density limit and between L- and H-mode confinement. Feedback control for the X-point radiator (XPR) position was established as an important element for divertor detachment control. Stable and detached ELM-free phases with H-mode confinement quality were obtained when the XPR was moved 10 cm above the X-point. Investigations of the plasma in the future flexible snow-flake divertor of AUG by means of first SOLPS-ITER simulations with drifts activated predict beneficial detachment properties and the activation of an additional strike point by the drifts.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

Informing ARC divertor design and plasma facing material selection through integrated modeling

This INFUSE 2023 project between UCLA and Commonwealth Fusion Systems used computer modeling to test whether tungsten materials can survive in CFS's ARC fusion reactor divertor. The team simulated plasma conditions and material responses, finding that tungsten-rhenium alloys resist grain growth better than pure tungsten, and that hydrogen buildup depends more on particle flux than temperature. The work helps CFS design durable plasma-facing components for their fusion power plant.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗

Combined Normal and Disruption, Electromagnetic Transient, Thermal, and Structural Analysis of COMPASS Upgrade

We report that COMPASS Upgrade is a replacement for the COMPASS device at the Institute of Plasma Physics (IPP) of the Czech Academy of Sciences. It is a cryogenic copper machine with a major radius of 0.89 m, with 5 T at the plasma centerline and 2-MA plasma current. It is intended to develop ITER relevant plasma densities and high power fluxes in the divertor region. The entire vacuum vessel is planned to reach 500 °C. The COMPASS-U TF coil is a bitter plate-like design with radial conductor plates that extend the width of the TF inner leg. Currents redistribute radially based on resistive and inductive effects. This necessitates an electromagnetic (EM) transient analysis of the coil current distribution. For copper coils like COMPASS Upgrade, the solution must be coupled with a thermal solution to properly include the temperature-dependent resistive effects. The EM transient solution includes the TF magnetic loads, and a stress pass on the results produces in-plane loads. The EM solution chosen requires inclusion of all the conducting and nonconducting regions surrounding the TF coil. With the TF current distribution solved, the addition of the poloidal coils and resulting background fields allows the determination of the out-of-plane loads. Integration of the Joule heating produced from the EM solution produces temperature distributions throughout the shot, which can be read in to a structural pass to include thermal stresses in the evaluation. This is true of both TF and PF temperature prediction with appropriate packing fractions. Currents in the PF coils, with computed background fields, produce Lorentz loads. Time transients of the PF currents produce startup eddy currents in the structures included in the model; inclusion of the vessel and other passive structures allows these to be included in a stress pass. The EM transient solution includes all the elements needed for a disruption analysis with prescribed motions and quench of the plasma. From a model originally intended to simulate current diffusion in the TF coil, the analysis can be refined to be used to predict the performance of most of the components of the tokamak or provide boundary conditions for more detailed submodels. In this article, the use of the current diffusion model for bounding assessments of the COMPASS Upgrade TF, PF, vessel, external structure, and disruption analyses will be presented.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

The Verification and Validation of a Magnetic Plasma Fluid Model Utilizing the MOOSE (Multiphysics Object Oriented Simulation Environment) Framework

As the goal of achieving fusion power on the grid comes closer to fruition, fully coupled multiphysics models of fusion devices will be crucial. Currently, there are two main approaches to developing these platforms: (1) loosely coupled, where one couples existing codes and solvers together through input and output parameters and data, and (2) tightly coupled, where one develops the necessary models within a singular, integrated framework. This work focuses on the latter approach for magnetically confined fusion devices by developing a fluid-based plasma-edge model within the Multiphysics Object Oriented Simulation Environment (MOOSE) Framework. This effort is coordinated with other efforts to develop, test, demonstrate, and deploy fusion relevant multiphysics capabilities including electromagnetics, particle-in-cell plasma, tritium transport, and fusion blanket design. This new model is an expansion of the MOOSE-based plasma application, Zapdos, which was originally formulated to model low-temperature, non-magnetized plasma processes. Verification, benchmarking, and validation studies have been conducted. Verification studies involved utilizing the method of manufactured solutions and comparing the convergence slope of a known solution to the theoretical slope. Benchmarking consists of comparisons to existing edge codes, namely BOUT++ and SOLEDGE3X. Validation efforts focused on comparisons against open-source data from the TCV tokamak.

70 - PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

The separatrix electron density in JET, ASDEX upgrade and alcator C-Mod H-mode plasmas: A common evaluation procedure and correlation with engineering parameters

The separatrix electron density is an important parameter for core-edge scenario integration in tokamak devices, as it influences plasma confinement, divertor detachment and disruption avoidance. This quantity has been measured in H-mode discharges on JET, ASDEX Upgrade and Alcator C-Mod by applying the same fitting function to Thomson scattering measurements, and by employing the same analysis technique based on scrape-off layer power balance. To estimate the power crossing the separatrix, the inter-ELM time derivative of the plasma energy d W /d t has been experimentally evaluated and found to be approximately a constant fraction of the absorbed heating power. Correlations between n e,sep and engineering parameters have been investigated, revealing that n e,sep scales with the divertor neutral pressure p 0,div in a similar manner across all devices. Additionally, when n e,sep is normalized to the obtained n e,sep dependency, no clear correlation with the plasma current is found. These observations are in agreement with the 2-point model, which suggests that the upstream separatrix density is mainly set by the recycling at the divertor target.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

Artificial intelligence-based predictive modeling for imaging neutral particle analyzers on the DIII-D tokamak

The Imaging Neutral Particle Analyzer (INPA) at DIII-D is a diagnostic system used to accurately resolve the energy and spatial distributions of fast ions in fusion plasmas. A novel artificial intelligence (AI) technique named INPA-net is based on Reservoir Computing Networks and developed here to predict active and passive signals produced by charge-exchange reactions from injected and edge-cold neutrals, respectively, in magnetically confined fusion plasmas. This model is trained using a set of 21 time domain signals between 0 s to 3.35 s that includes injected beam and thermal plasma information, and 6444 real 2D experimental images of the INPA in 12 plasma discharges at DIII-D. The trained neural network is able to forecast experimental images in real-time. The model achieves an R-squared value of 0.91, which is higher than the 0.83 value achieved by a simple linear regression model. This improvement highlights the model's enhanced predictive accuracy for measured images from the validation set. This AI approach is valuable due to its rapid response times and potential for integration into real-time plasma control systems. A version of this model capable of generating syntehic images would be useful for the real-time monitoring of fast-ion transport. A comprehensive sensitivity study reveals that INPA-net maintains high performance even with variations in the input parameters, indicating the model's robustness and reliability. While developed for the INPA, the underlying architecture is adaptable and may be applied to various 2D imaging diagnostics in fusion research.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

MMMnet: A Neural Network Surrogate for Real-Time Transport Prediction Based on the Updated Multi-Mode Model

The Multi-Mode Model (MMM) is a physics-based anomalous transport model integrated into TRANSP for predicting electron and ion thermal transport, electron and impurity particle transport, and toroidal and poloidal momentum transport. While MMM provides valuable predictive capabilities, its computational cost, although manageable for standard simulations, is too high for real-time control applications. MMMnet, a neural network-based surrogate model, is developed to address this challenge by significantly reducing computation time while maintaining high accuracy. Trained on TRANSP simulations of DIII-D discharges, MMMnet incorporates an updated version of MMM (9.0.10) with enhanced physics, including isotopic effects, plasma shaping via effective magnetic shear, unified correlation lengths for ion-scale modes, and a new physics-based model for the electromagnetic electron temperature gradient mode. A key advancement is MMMnet’s ability to predict all six transport coefficients, providing a comprehensive representation of plasma transport dynamics. MMMnet achieves a two-order-of-magnitude speed improvement while maintaining strong correlation with MMM diffusivities, making it well-suited for real-time tokamak control and scenario optimization.

DIII-D↗

Transport and confinement physics: Chapter 2 of the special issue: on the path to tokamak burning plasma operation

Progress in physics understanding and theoretical model development of plasma transport and confinement (TC) in the ITPA TC Topical Group since the publication of the ITER Physics Basis (IPB) document (Doyle et al 2007 Nucl. Fusion 47 S18) was summarized focusing on the contributions to ITER and burning plasma prediction and control. This paper provides a general and streamlined overview on the advances that were mainly led by the ITPA TC joint experiments and joint activities for the last 15 years (see JEX/JA table in appendix). This paper starts with the scientific strategy and scope of the ITPA TC Topical group and overall picture of the major progress, followed by the progress of each research field: particle transport, impurity transport, ion and electron thermal turbulent transport, momentum transport, impact of 3D magnetic fields on transport, confinement mode transitions, global confinement, and reduced transport modeling. Cross references with other Topical Groups are given in order to highlight overlapped topics, such as the 3D effect on the plasma transport in the edge and L-H transition physics. The increasing overlap between the topical groups is a reflection of the progress on integrating the known physics into comprehensive models that are better and better able to reproduce the plasma transport. In recent years, such integration has become increasingly prevalent when considering transport from the SOL, through the edge pedestal, and into the plasma core. In the near future, increased collaboration also with the magneto-hydrodynamic and energetic particles community will be important as we approach burning plasma conditions in next-step fusion devices. A summary of remaining challenges and next steps for each research field is given in the Summary section.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

High Performance Equilibrium Solvers for Integrated Magnetic Fusion Simulations

With the funding provided by this award, we developed numerical codes for the study of magnetically confined plasmas for fusion applications. Accordingly, our work can be divided into two separate categories: 1) the design and analysis of novel numerical methods providing high accuracy and high efficiency; 2) the study of the equilibrium and stability of magnetically confined plasmas with some of these numerical codes, as well as the study of the nature of the turbulent behavior which may arise in the presence of instabilities. We first developed new numerical schemes based on integral equation methods for the computation of steady-state magnetic configurations in fusion experiments, providing high accuracy for the magnetic field and its derivatives, which are required for stability and turbulence calculations. We employed different integral formulations depending on the application of interest: axisymmetric or non-axisymmetric equilibria, force-free or magnetohydrodynamic equilibria, fixed-boundary equilibria or free-boundary equilibria. While efficient, these methods do not yet apply to plasma boundaries which are not smooth, a situation which is fairly common in magnetic confinement experiments. To address this temporary weakness, we also constructed a new steady-state solver based on the Hybridizable Discontinuous Galerkin (HDG) method, which provides full geometric flexibility. In addition to these numerical tools focused on steady-states, we also contributed to the improvement of the speed and accuracy of codes simulating the plasma dynamics of fusion plasmas, by developing a novel velocity space representation for the efficient solution of kinetic equations, which most accurately describe the time evolution of hot plasmas in fusion experiments. Using the tools discussed above, we studied several questions pertaining to the equilibrium and stability of magnetically confined plasmas. In particular, we derived a new simple model for axisymmetric devices called tokamaks, to predict how elongated a fusion plasma can be before it becomes unstable and collapses. We also looked at the effect of the shape of the outer plasma surface on key properties of the steady-state magnetic configurations, and how these properties impact turbulence in fusion plasmas, and the corresponding transport of momentum. Likewise, we studied the role of large localized flows on the steady-state magnetic configurations, and how they may influence plasma stability and turbulence. Non-axisymmetric steady-state magnetic configurations are inherently more complex than axisymmetric steady-state configurations, and the subject of ongoing controversies regarding the regularity of the equations determining such steady-states, and their solutions. Implementing an existing NYU code in a new geometry, we studied the nature of the singularity of the solutions observed in the code, and methods to eliminate them. Our main conclusion is that by appropriately tailoring the plasma boundary, it is possible to eliminate the singularities otherwise appearing in our simulations, and to obtain steady-states which appear to be smooth. To gain further insights on incompletely understood turbulence phenomena, we proposed a new reduced model capturing most of these phenomena, which is simple enough to not require expensive numerical simulations on massive supercomputers to investigate them. We demonstrated the strong similarity between our simulations and published results obtained from computationally expensive simulations, and plan to rely on our reduced model to identify the key mechanisms determining the evolution and strength turbulent driven transport in fusion plasmas. Finally, we proposed a new framework for tokamak reactor design studies, enabling us to consider the relative merits of steady-state versus pulsed fusion reactors. We found that pulsed fusion reactors may benefit most from recent advances in magnet technology, and the availability of very high field magnets. As such, they may become more desirable than steady-state tokamak reactors for cost efficient electricity generation.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗