H-mode experiments on Alcator C-Mod [I.H. Hutchinson, et al., Phys. Plasma 1 (1994) 1511] which exhibit an internal transport barrier (ITB), have been examined with gyrokinetic simulations, near the ITB onset time. Linear simulations support the picture of ion and electron temperature gradient (ITG, ETG) microturbulence driving high [chi]{sub i} and [chi]{sub e}, respectively, and that stable ITG correlates with reduced particle transport and improved ion thermal confinement on C-Mod. In the barrier region ITG is weakly unstable, with a critical temperature gradient higher than expected from standard models. Nonlinear calculations and the role of E x B shear suppression of turbulence outside the plasma core are discussed in light of recent profile measurements for the toroidal velocity. The gyrokinetic model benchmarks successfully against experiment in the plasma core.

Insight into microturbulence and transport in tokamak plasmas is being sought using linear simulations of drift waves near the onset time of an internal transport barrier (ITB) on Alcator C-Mod. Microturbulence is likely generated by instabilities of drift waves and causes transport of heat and particles. This transport is studied because the containment of heat and particles is important for the achievement of practical nuclear fusion. We investigate nearness to marginal stability of ion temperature gradient (ITG) modes for conditions in the ITB region at the trigger time for ITB formation. Data from C-Mod, analyzed by TRANSP (a time dependent transport analysis code), is read by the code TRXPL and made into input files for the parallel gyrokinetic model code GS2. Temperature and density gradients in these input files are modified to produce new input files. Results from these simulations show a weak ITG instability in the barrier region at the time of onset, above marginal stability; the normalized critical temperature gradient is 80% of the experimental temperature gradient. The growth rate increases linearly above the critical value, with the spectrum of ITG modes remaining parabolic up to a multiplicative factor of 2. The effect of varying density gradients is found to be much weaker and causes the fastest growing drift mode to change from ITG to trapped electron mode character. Simulations were carried out on the NERSC IBM 6000 SP using 4 nodes, 16 processors per node. Predictive simulations were examined for converged instability after 10,000-50,000 timesteps in each case. Each simulation took approximately 30 minutes to complete on the IBM SP.

The formation of internal transport barriers (ITB) has been observed in the core region of Alcator C-Mod under a variety of conditions. The improvement in core confinement following pellet injection (pellet enhanced performance or PEP mode) has been well documented on Alcator C-Mod in the past. Recently three new ITB phenomena have been observed which require no externally applied particle or momentum input. Short lived ITBs form spontaneously following the high confinement (H) to low confinement (L) mode transition and are characterized by a large increase in the global neutron production (enhanced neutron or EN modes.) Experiments with ICRF (ion cyclotron range of frequencies) power injection to the plasma off-axis on the high field side results in the central density rising abruptly and becoming peaked. The ITB formed at this time lasts for 10 energy confinement times. The central toroidal rotation velocity decreases and changes sign as the density rises. Similar spontaneous ITBs have been observed in ohmically heated H-mode plasmas. All of these ITB events have strongly peaked density profiles with a minimum in the density scale length occurring near r/a = 0.5 and have improved confinement parameters in the core region of the plasma. Keywords: Alcator C-Mod; confinement; tokamaks; transport phenomena; neutrons.

Insight into plasma microturbulence and transport is being sought using linear simulations of drift waves on the National Spherical Torus Experiment (NSTX), following a study of drift wave modes on the Alcator C-Mod Tokamak. Microturbulence is likely generated by instabilities of drift waves, which cause transport of heat and particles. Understanding this transport is important because the containment of heat and particles is required for the achievement of practical nuclear fusion. Microtearing modes may cause high heat transport through high electron thermal conductivity. It is hoped that microtearing will be stable along with good electron transport in the proposed low collisionality International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER). Stability of the microtearing mode is investigated for conditions at mid-radius in a high density NSTX high performance (H-mode) plasma, which is compared to the proposed ITER plasmas. The microtearing mode is driven by the electron temperature gradient, and believed to be mediated by ion collisions and magnetic shear. Calculations are based on input files produced by TRXPL following TRANSP (a time-dependent transport analysis code) analysis. The variability of unstable mode growth rates is examined as a function of ion and electron collisionalities using the parallel gyrokinetic computational code GS2. Results show the microtearing mode stability dependence for a range of plasma collisionalities. Computation verifies analytic predictions that higher collisionalities than in the NSTX experiment increase microtearing instability growth rates, but that the modes are stabilized at the highest values. There is a transition of the dominant mode in the collisionality scan to ion temperature gradient character at both high and low collisionalities. The calculations suggest that plasma electron thermal confinement may be greatly improved in the low-collisionality ITER.

Double transport barrier modes (simultaneous core and edge transport barrier) have been observed with off-axis ion cyclotron range of frequencies (ICRF) heating in the Alcator C-Mod tokamak [I.H. Hutchinson et al., Phys. Plasmas 1, 1511(1994)]. An internal transport barrier (ITB) is routinely produced in enhanced D[alpha] H-mode (EDA) discharges where the minority ion cyclotron resonance layer is at r/a (0.5) during the current flat top phase of the discharge. The density profile becomes peaked without the presence of a particle source in the plasma core and continues to peak until the increased core impurity radiation arrests the improved energy confinement, ultimately leading to a barrier collapse. With the addition of moderate (0.6 MW) central ICRF heating, the double barrier mode was maintained for as long as the ICRF power was applied and modeling shows that the internal thermal barrier was maintained throughout the discharge. The presence of sawteeth throughout most of the ITB discharge allows sawtooth induced heat pulse analysis to be performed. This analysis indicates that there is an abrupt radial discontinuity in the heat pulse time to peak profile when an ITB is present. Furthermore, this discontinuity appears to move into the core plasma from the edge region in about 0.2 sec, several confinement times. The deduced thermal diffusivity, Xhp indicates a barrier exists in the electron thermal transport, the barrier is limited to a narrow radial region, and the transport is unaffected outside this narrow radial extent.