Gyrokinetic simulations of an electron temperature gradient turbulence driven current in tokamak plasmas

Abstract

We report the results of a gyrokinetic simulation study elucidating the characteristics of the current driven by electron temperature gradient (ETG) turbulence in toroidal geometry. We examined the amount of the ETG turbulence-driven current for different turbulence levels, which were obtained by varying the relative electron gyroradius ρ* = ρe/a. Simulations show that the amount of the ETG turbulence-driven current increases with ρ* due to the gyro-Bohm scaling of turbulence intensity. A perturbation of the equilibrium q-profile by the ETG turbulence-driven current becomes noticeable when ρ* > 1/4000. Even in a small ρ* case, the proportional relation between the ETG turbulence-driven current and turbulence intensity suggests that a considerable intrinsic current can be driven inside an edge pedestal where a steep gradient of the electron temperature profile can excite ETG turbulence in a narrow region.