Electrostatic potential variation on the flux surface and its impact on impurity transport

Abstract

The impurity transport in magnetically confined plasmas under some conditions finds neither quantitatively nor qualitatively a satisfactory theory-based explanation. This compromises the successful realization of thermo-nuclear fusion for energy production since impurity accumulation is known to be one of the causes that limits the plasma performance through radiative losses and plasma dilution. Under stellarator reactor-relevant conditions, accumulation is supported by the negative (inwards pointing) radial electric field which must arise to satisfy the ambipolarity constraint on the neoclassical particle fluxes. The high charge number of the impurities makes their transport particularly sensitive to the presence of electric fields and, consequently, the electrostatic potential variation on the flux surface, , which conventional neoclassical theory usually neglects, may contribute to the theoretical interpretation of experimental results not yet fully understood, e.g. Ida et al (2009 Phys. Plasmas 16 056111) and Yoshinuma et al (2009 Nucl. Fusion 49 062002).