Nonlinear MHD simulation of core plasma collapse events in stellarators

TL;DR

This paper uses 3D nonlinear MHD simulations to study core plasma collapse events in stellarators, revealing how nonlinear mode coupling leads to stochastic magnetic fields and pressure drops.

Contribution

It introduces a detailed nonlinear MHD simulation approach to understand core collapse events and magnetic topology changes in stellarators.

Findings

High-n ballooning modes initiate the collapse sequence.

Nonlinear coupling causes magnetic field stochasticity.

Core plasma pressure drops due to stochastic field diffusion.

Abstract

The core collapse events observed in a stellarator experiment are studied by a three-dimensional nonlinear MHD simulations. In the low magnetic shear configuration like the Wendelstein 7-X, the rotational transform profile is very sensitive to the toroidal current density. The 3D equilibrium with localized toroidal current density is studied. If the toroidal current density follows locally in the middle of the plasma minor radius, the rotational transform is also changed locally. Sometimes, the magnetic topology changes due to appearing the magnetic island. The nonlinear behaviors of the MHD instability are studied by a full three-dimensional nonlinear MHD code. It was found that a following sequence. At first, the high-n ballooning-type mode structure appears in the plasma core, and then the mode linearly grows. The high-n ballooning modes nonlinearly couple and saturate. The mode structure changes to the low-n mode. In that phase, the magnetic field structure becomes strongly stochastic into the plasma core due to the nonlinear coupling. Finally, the plasma pressure diffuses along the stochastic field lines, and then the core plasma pressure drops. This is an important results to interpret the core collapse event by strong nonlinear coupling.