The structure of the toroidal rotation profile with mixed heating by neutral beam injection (NBI) and electron cyclotron resonance heating (ECH) has been investigated in KSTAR L-mode plasmas. ECH with varying resonance layer positions was used for heating a mix control. The experimental results show that ECH causes a counter-current rotation increment both for off-axis and on-axis ECH heating. For L-mode plasmas, off-axis ECH produces larger counter-current rotation than on-axis ECH. Analysis of ion heat and momentum transport for the ECH L-mode plasmas shows that the electron temperature gradient is the main reason for the degradation of ion heat confinement and also the main driving force for the non-diffusive momentum flux. As a possible mechanism for the counter-current intrinsic torque with ECH, the transition of the turbulence mode from ion temperature gradient (ITG) to the trapped electron mode (TEM) with the resulting sign change of turbulence driven residual stress is suggested. A linear gyro-kinetic analysis shows the ITG → TEM transition occurs in a localized region during ECH injection, and the trend of TEM excitation is consistent with the observed macroscopic trend of the toroidal rotation.

Toroidal rotation profiles have been investigated in KSTAR H-mode plasma using combined auxiliary heating by co-neutral beam injection (NBI) and electron cyclotron resonance heating (ECH). The ion temperature and toroidal rotation are measured with x-ray imaging crystal spectroscopy and charge exchange recombination spectroscopy. H-mode plasma is achieved using co-current 1.3 MW NBI, and a 0.35 MW ECH pulse is added to the flat-top of H-mode. The core rotation profiles, which are centrally peaked in the pure NBI heating phase, flatten when ECH is injected, while the edge pedestal is unchanged. Dramatic decreases in the core toroidal rotation values (ΔVtor/V tor ∼ -30%) are observed when on-axis ECH is added to H-mode. The experimental data show that the decrease of core rotation velocity and its gradient are correlated with the increase of core electron temperature and its gradient, and also with the likely steepening of the density gradient. We thus explore the viability of a hypothesized ITG (ITG ion temperature gradient instability) → TEM (trapped electron mode instability) transition as the explanation of the observed counter-current flow induced by ECH. However, the results of linear microstability analyses using inferred profiles suggest that the TEM is excited only in the deep core, so the viability of the hypothesized explanation is not yet clear. © 2013 IAEA, Vienna.

We report recent experimental results from HL-2A and KSTAR on ELM mitigation by supersonic molecular beam injection (SMBI). Cold particle deposition within the pedestal by SMBI is verified in both machines. The signatures of ELM mitigation by SMBI are an ELM frequency increase and ELM amplitude decrease. These persist for an SMBI influence time τI. Here, τI is the time for the SMBI influenced pedestal profile to refill. An increase in fELMSMBI/fELM0 and a decrease in the energy loss per ELM ΔWELM were achieved in both machines. Physical insight was gleaned from studies of density and vΦ (toroidal rotation velocity) evolution, particle flux and turbulence spectra, divertor heat load. The characteristic gradients of the pedestal density soften and a change in vΦ was observed during a τI time. The spectra of the edge particle flux Γ ∼ 〈ṽrñe〉 and density fluctuation with and without SMBI were measured in HL-2A and in KSTAR, respectively. A clear phenomenon observed is the decrease in divertor heat load during the τI time in HL-2A. Similar results are the profiles of saturation current density Jsat with and without SMBI in KSTAR. We note that τI/τp (particle confinement time) is close to ∼1, although there is a large difference in individual τI between the two machines. This suggests that τI is strongly related to particle-transport events. Experiments and analysis of a simple phenomenological model support the important conclusion that ELM mitigation by SMBI results from an increase in higher frequency fluctuations and transport events in the pedestal. © 2014 IAEA, Vienna.