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Fusion energy: Progress, partnerships, and the path to deployment
Over the past decade, fusion energy has moved decisively from scientific aspiration toward a credible pathway to a new energy technology. Thanks to long-term federal support, we have significantly advanced our fundamental understanding of plasma physics—the behavior of the superheated gases at the heart of fusion devices. This knowledge will enable the creation and control of fusion fuel under conditions required for future power plants. Our progress is exemplified by breakthroughs at the National Ignition Facility and the Joint European Torus.
Hongda He, J. Q. Dong, Zhixiong He, K. Zhao
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 70 | Number 1 | July 2016 | Pages 54-61
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/FST15-169
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The density gradient of fast ions is the main driving force for fishbone instability that in turn results in fast ion loss. It is possible to reduce the instability by eliminating the density gradient of the fast ions by employing dual neutral beam injection (DNBI) in tokamak plasmas. The dispersion relation for the fishbone instability is applied to the case of DNBI with suitable fast ion distribution functions. The results show that the density distribution of fast ions of DNBI can bring about a stable window that is a range of values for the distance between the on-axis beam and the off-axis beam that yields an overall stabilization of the resultant fishbone mode. The width of the stable window increases linearly with the position of the safety factor q = 1 magnetic flux surface increasing. In addition, the width of the stable window becomes wider for a more peaked density profile of fast ions and keeps constant for a peaked enough density profile of fast ions. The growth rates of the fishbone modes dramatically decrease with the intensity ratio of off-axis neutral beam injection (NBI) and on-axis NBI, and the critical beta values of fast ions increase with the intensity ratio increasing. Fishbone modes can be avoided with DNBI, which may be an effective method to prevent fast ion loss resulting from fishbone instabilities.