Simulations of first-orbit losses of neutral beam injection (NBI) fast ions on EAST

Abstract

Simulations of first-orbit losses of neutral beam injection (NBI) fast ions in the EAST tokamak have been studied in detail by using the orbit-following code GYCAVA and the NBI code TGCO. Beam ion losses with the wall boundary are smaller than those with the last closed flux surface boundary. In contrast to heat loads on the wall without radio frequency wave (RFW) antennas, heat loads on the wall with RFW antennas are distributed more locally near the RFW antennas. The direction of the toroidal magnetic field dramatically affects the final positions of lost fast ions, which is related to the magnetic drift. The numerical results on heat loads of beam ions corresponding to different toroidal magnetic fields are qualitatively consistent with the experimental results. Beam ion losses increase with the beam energy for the co-current NBIs and the counter-perpendicular NBI. We have studied the behavior of fast ions produced by a small section neutral beam (beamlet) by using the numerical tool NBIT. The distributions of the loss fraction of beamlet fast ions peaked near the edge of the beam section for the counter-current NBIs, and they are related to the injection angle. This indicates that the first-orbit losses can be reduced by changing the shape of beam cross section.