Impact of E × B shear flow on low-n MHD instabilities.

Recently, the stationary high confinement operations with improved pedestal conditions have been achieved in DIII-D [K. H. Burrell et al., Phys. Plasmas 23, 056103 (2016)], accompanying the spontaneous transition from the coherent edge harmonic oscillation (EHO) to the broadband MHD turbulence state by reducing the neutral beam injection torque to zero. It is highly significant for the burning plasma devices such as ITER. Simulations about the effects of E × B shear flow on the quiescent H-mode (QH-mode) are carried out using the three-field two-fluid model in the field-aligned coordinate under the BOUT++ framework. Using the shifted circular cross-section equilibriums including bootstrap current, the results demonstrate that the E × B shear flow strongly destabilizes low-n peeling modes, which are mainly driven by the gradient of parallel current in peeling-dominant cases and are sensitive to the Er shear. Adopting the much more general shape of E × B shear ([Formula: see text]) profiles, the linear and nonlinear BOUT++ simulations show qualitative consistence with the experiments. The stronger shear flow shifts the most unstable mode to lower-n and narrows the mode spectrum. At the meantime, the nonlinear simulations of the QH-mode indicate that the shear flow in both co- and counter directions of diamagnetic flow has some similar effects. The nonlinear mode interaction is enhanced during the mode amplitude saturation phase. These results reveal that the fundamental physics mechanism of the QH-mode may be shear flow and are significant for understanding the mechanism of EHO and QH-mode.

Fast resistive reconnection regime in the nonlinear evolution of double tearing modes.

Phases of nonlinear double tearing modes are studied numerically. The first two phases lead to the formation and growth of magnetic islands and are followed by a fast reconnection phase to complete the process, driven by a process of neighboring magnetic separatrices merging and magnetic islands coupling. The fast growth can be understood as a result of the island interaction equivalent to a steadily inward flux boundary driven. Resistivity dependences for various phases are studied and shown by scaling analysis for the first time. It is found that after an early Sweet-Parker phase with a eta(1/2)-scale, a slow nonlinear phase in a Rutherford regime with a eta(1)-scale is followed by the fast reconnection phase with a eta(1/5)-scale.

Structures and stability of medium silicon clusters. II. Ab initio molecular orbital calculations of Si12-Si20.

Ab initio all-electron molecular-orbital calculations are carried out to study the structures and relative stability of low-energy silicon clusters (Si(n),n = 12-20). Selected geometric isomers include those predicted by Ho et al. [Nature (London) 392, 582 (1998)] based on an unbiased search with tight-binding/genetic algorithm, as well as those found by Rata et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 85, 546 (2000)] based on density-functional tight-binding/single-parent evolution algorithm. These geometric isomers are optimized at the Møller-Plesset (MP2) MP2/6-31G(d) level. The single-point energy at the coupled-cluster single and double substitutions (including triple excitations) [CCSD(T)] CCSD(T)/6-31G(d) level for several low-lying isomers are further computed. Harmonic vibrational frequency analysis at the MP2/6-31G(d) level of theory is also undertaken to assure that the optimized geometries are stable. For Si12-Si17 and Si19 the isomer with the lowest-energy at the CCSD(T)/6-31G(d) level is the same as that predicted by Ho et al., whereas for Si18 and Si20, the same as predicted by Rata et al. However, for Si14 and Si15, the vibrational frequency analysis indicates that the isomer with the lowest CCSD(T)/6-31G(d) single-point energy gives rise to imaginary frequencies. Small structural perturbation onto the Si14 and Si15 isomers can remove the imaginary frequencies and results in new isomers with slightly lower MP2/6-31G(d) energy; however the new isomers have a higher single-point energy at the CCSD(T)/6-31G(d) level. For most Si(n) (n = 12-18,20) the low-lying isomers are prolate in shape, whereas for Si19 a spherical-like isomer is slightly lower in energy at the CCSD(T)/6-31G(d) level than low-lying prolate isomers.