Role of a MHD mode crash in triggering H-mode at marginal heating power on the HL-2A tokamak

Abstract

The impact of a low frequency MHD mode crash on triggering the H-mode has been studied in detail on the HL-2A tokamak. The mode manifests fishbone characteristics with a precession frequency f≈14–19 kHz. The abrupt mode crash evokes substantial energy release from the core to the plasma boundary and hence increases the edge pressure gradient and Er×B flow shear, which further suppresses turbulence and leads to confinement improvement into the H-mode. Under the same NBI heating (∼1 MW), the I-phase plasma transits into H-mode with a rapid MHD mode crash while it returns to the L-mode without the presence of the mode in the I-phase. With increasing heating power by the ECRH added to the NBI, the MHD mode disappears. The statistical result shows that with the MHD mode crash the heating power for accessing the H-mode is significantly lower than that without the mode crash. All these facts reveal that the MHD mode crash in the I-phase plays a critical role in trigging the I→H transition at marginal heating power. In addition, it has been found that with the same NBI power heating, the magnitude of the mode (crash) increases with increasing plasma density, implying larger energy release being needed to access the H-mode for higher density plasmas.