Nonlinear gyrokinetic simulation of fast ion-driven modes including continuum interaction

Abstract

Energetic particle transport in toroidal magnetic confinement fusion devices can be enhanced by the particles' interaction with electromagnetic global modes. This process has been modelled numerically. The most extensive work has been with reduced models, which may use a simplified description of the bulk plasma, assuming a perturbative approximation for mode structure evolution, restrict simulation to the linear phase, or some combination. In this work, nonlinear non-perturbative simulations are performed using a fully gyrokinetic and reduced models of the bulk plasma. Previous linear investigation of a simple model tokamak case is extended to show that, at least under some conditions, dramatic qualitative differences in mode structure and saturated mode amplitude can exist due to non-perturbative response in the linear and nonlinear phases that depends upon the bulk plasma physics. This supports analytical work which has shown that the non-perturbative energetic particle response should depend upon the magnetic geometry and kinetic physics. It is also shown that energetic particle modes that dominate in the linear phase can be subdominant to a non-perturbative toroidal Alfvén eigenmode-based global structure in the nonlinear phase.