Hybrid-kinetic simulation of synergy between fishbone/sawtooth and tearing mode-induced energetic-ion transport in a tokamak plasma

Abstract

The resonant interaction between tearing mode (TM) and energetic ions redistributed by fishbone/sawtooth collapse has been observed recently in HL-2A neutral beam injection-heated high-density plasmas, where m is the poloidal mode number and n is the toroidal mode number. This event essentially results from a synergistic effect with a multiple-mode nature. Understanding such experimental phenomena, especially when using high-power auxiliary heating, is crucial for achieving high-performance plasmas with high confinement and high β N in the prospective thermonuclear fusion reactors. In this work, based on the typical experimental phenomenon of synergy between fishbone/sawtooth and TM on HL-2A, a self-consistent nonlinear hybrid-kinetic simulation is conducted utilizing the experimental parameters and profiles before the occurrence of this synergy as the code M3D-K input. In particular, we focus chiefly on the phase-space transport, loss and redistribution of energetic ions induced by two cases, one with only TM and one with synergy between fishbone/sawtooth and TM. It is found that the synergy of the fishbone/sawtooth and TM on energetic-ion transport, loss and redistribution is important and can dramatically enhance the loss rate of energetic ions compared with the case with only TM. It is due to the fact that such synergy can open up an efficient energetic-ion loss channel which connects the plasma center and edge. The phase space transport and redistribution of energetic ions induced by the two different cases are also respectively analyzed and compared in detail. Because of the overestimation of amplitudes of fishbone/sawtooth and TM in the simulations, the obtained energetic-ion transport level is only limited in the context of the numerical framework. These findings indicate that the synergy triggering the sawtooth collapse may lead to an enhancement of the energetic-ion transport and can help us understand the underlying mechanisms of synergy-induced energetic-ion transport.