ABSTRACT
The onset of a neoclassical tearing mode (NTM) depends on the existence of a large enough seed island. It is shown in the Joint European Torus that NTMs can be readily destabilized by long-period sawteeth, such as obtained by sawtooth stabilization from ion-cyclotron heating or current drive. This has important implications for burning plasma scenarios, as alpha particles strongly stabilize the sawteeth. It is also shown that, by adding heating and current drive just outside the inversion radius, sawteeth are destabilized, resulting in shorter sawtooth periods and larger beta values being obtained without NTMs.
ABSTRACT
High confinement [with H = 1, ITERH- 98( y,2)] at beta(N) approximately 2.3 has been found in ASDEX Upgrade discharges with existing (m,n) = (3,2) neoclassical tearing modes (NTMs). The reason for the high confinement at high beta(N) values is a transition of the NTMs into the so-called frequently interrupted regime. In this regime, the NTM growth is frequently interrupted by sudden drops in amplitude. Because of the long NTM growth time, the resulting averaged NTM amplitude remains much smaller than the corresponding saturated value. As this behavior with the beneficial effect on energy confinement has been confirmed at JET, such a high confinement regime at beta(N)>2 might also be expected for ITER.