arXiv subjects

G. T. A. Huijsmans

Publications and source records attributed to G. T. A. Huijsmans.

17 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2025

Comparison of MHD and gyrokinetic simulations of linear instabilities at the q = 1 surface

Accurate modeling of core instabilities in tokamak plasmas is essential to understand the underlying physical mechanisms and their impact on plasma confinement. The ideal stability of the internal kink mode and the m = 1 collisionless tearing mode are analyzed numerically both with gyrokinetic and MHD codes. We compare the different models implemented in the codes and show that the gyrokinetic equations without collisions inherently contain the ideal MHD limit. The simulation results show that the stability of the internal kink mode strongly depends on the choice of several setup parameters like the inclusion of parallel magnetic field fluctuations, the tokamak aspect ratio, the drift- or gyrokinetic treatment of the ions and the electron mass. Furthermore, we demonstrate the stabilization of the instabilities by diamagnetic effects. Our results indicate that gyrokinetic and MHD models can be reconciled in the description of the internal kink mode by careful consideration of the simulation setup and model assumptions, but instabilities like the collisionless tearing mode require a more advanced treatment beyond MHD.

physics.plasm-ph↗

arXiv2024

Plasmoid drift and first wall heat deposition during ITER H-mode dual-SPIs in JOREK simulations

The heat flux mitigation during the Thermal Quench (TQ) by the Shattered Pellet Injection (SPI) is one of the major elements of disruption mitigation strategy for ITER. It's efficiency greatly depends on the SPI and the target plasma, and is ultimately checked by the heat deposition on to the PFCs. To investigate this, JOREK simulations of neon-mixed dual-SPIs into ITER baseline H-mode and a "degraded H-mode" with and without good injector synchronization are performed with focus on the first wall heat flux and its energy impact. It is found that low neon fraction SPIs into the baseline H-mode plasmas exhibit strong major radial plasmoid drift as the fragments arrive at the pedestal, accompanied by edge stochasticity. Significant density expulsion and outgoing heat flux occurs as a result, reducing the mitigation efficiency. Such drift motion could be mitigated by injecting higher neon fraction pellets', or by considering the pre-disruption confinement degradation, thus improving the radiation fraction. The radiation heat flux is found to peak in the vicinity of the fragment injection location in the early injection phase, while it relaxes later on due to parallel impurity transport. The overall radiation asymmetry could be significantly mitigated by good synchronization. Time integration of the local heat flux is carried out to provide its energy impact for wall heat damage assessment. For the baseline H-mode case with full pellet injection, melting of the stainless steel of the diagnostic port could occur near the injection port, which is acceptable, without any melting of the first wall tungsten tiles. For the degraded H-mode cases with quarter-pellet SPIs, which have 1/4 total volume of a full pellet, the maximum energy impact approaches the tolerable limit of the stainless steel with un-synchronized SPIs, and stays well below such limit for the perfectly synchronized ones.

physics.plasm-ph↗

arXiv2022

Development and application of a hybrid MHD-kinetic model in JOREK

Energetic particle (EP) driven instabilities will be of strongly increased relevance in future burning plasmas as the EP pressure will be very large compared to the thermal plasma. Understanding the interaction of EPs and bulk plasma is crucial for developing next-generation fusion devices. In this work, the JOREK MHD code is extended to allow for the simulation of EP instabilities at high EP pressures using realistic plasma and EP parameter in a full-f formulation with anisotropic pressure coupling to the bluid background. The code is first benchmarked linearly for the ITPA-TAE as well as the experiment based AUG-NLED cases, obtaining good agreement to other codes. Then, it is applied to a high energetic particle pressure discharge in the ASDEX Upgrade tokamak using a realistic non-Maxwellian distribution of EPs, reproducing aspects of the experimentally observed instabilities. Non-linear applications are possible based on the implentation, but will require dedicated verification and validation left for future work.

physics.plasm-ph↗

arXiv2021

MHD simulations of small ELMs at low triangularity in ASDEX Upgrade

The development of small- and no-ELM regimes for ITER is a high priority topic due to the risks associated to type-I ELMs. By considering non-linear extended MHD simulations of the ASDEX Upgrade tokamak with the JOREK code, we probe a regime that avoids type-I ELMs completely provided that the separatrix density is high enough. The dynamics of the pedestal in this regime are observed to be qualitatively similar to the so-called quasi-continuous exhaust (QCE) regime in several ways. Repetitive type-I ELMs are substituted by roughly constant levels of outwards transport caused by peeling-ballooning modes (with dominant ballooning characteristics) which are localised in the last 5\% of the confined region (in normalised poloidal flux). The simulated low triangularity plasma transitions to a type-I ELMy H-mode if the separatrix density is sufficiently reduced or if the input heating power is sufficiently increased. The stabilising factors that play a role in the suppression of the small ELMs are also investigated by analysing the simulations, and the importance of including diamagnetic effects in the simulations is highlighted. By considering a scan in the pedestal resistivity and by measuring the poloidal velocity of the modes (and comparing to theoretical estimates for ideal and resistive modes), we identify the underlying instabilities as resistive peeling-ballooning modes. Decreasing the resistivity below experimentally-relevant conditions (i.e., going towards ideal MHD), the peeling-ballooning modes that constrain the pedestal below the type-I ELM stability boundary display sharply decreasing growth rates.

physics.plasm-ph↗

arXiv2021

Collisional-radiative non-equilibrium impurity treatment for JOREK simulations

A collisional-radiative non-equilibrium impurity treatment for JOREK 3D nonlinear magneto-hydrodynamic (MHD) simulations has been developed. The impurities are represented by super-particles flowing along the fluid velocity field lines, while ionizing and recombining independently according to ADAS data and local fluid density and temperature. The non-equilibrium impurity contributions are then projected back to the fluid field for self-consistent time evolution. A 2D test case is used to compare the new non-equilibrium impurity model against previous Coronal Equilibrium (CE) impurity treatment, as well as to compare the non-equilibrium impurity behavior between the single and the two temperature model. Further, we conduct benchmark with previously published coronal non-equilibrium results by other 3D nonlinear MHD codes such as M3D-C1 and NIMROD. The new non-equilibrium treatment is shown to successfully capture the early phase cooling by weakly ionized impurities which the CE model missed. The benchmarks with M3D-C1 and NIMROD show general agreement in both the integrated quantities and the 2D profile evolution, despite the difference in the atomic model used. The above comparison and benchmark cases demonstrate the capability of the non-equilibrium impurity model for JOREK, paving the way for more sophisticated 3D non-linear Massive Material Injection (MMI) simulations which have important applications in disruption mitigation studies.

physics.plasm-ph↗

arXiv2021

Comparing spontaneous and pellet-triggered ELMs via non-linear extended MHD simulations

Injecting frozen deuterium pellets into an ELMy H-mode plasma is a well established scheme for triggering edge localized modes (ELMs) before they naturally occur. Based on an ASDEX Upgrade H-mode plasma, this article presents a comparison of extended MHD simulations of spontaneous type-I ELMs and pellet-triggered ELMs allowing to study their non-linear dynamics in detail. In particular, pellet-triggered ELMs are simulated by injecting deuterium pellets into different time points during the pedestal build-up described in [A. Cathey et al. Nuclear Fusion 60, 124007 (2020)]. Realistic ExB and diamagnetic background plasma flows as well as the time dependent bootstrap current evolution are included during the build-up to capture the balance between stabilising and destabilising terms for the edge instabilities accurately. Dependencies on the pellet size and injection times are studied. The spatio-temporal structures of the modes and the resulting divertor heat fluxes are compared in detail between spontaneous and triggered ELMs. We observe that the premature excitation of ELMs by means of pellet injection is caused by a helical perturbation described by a toroidal mode number of n = 1. In accordance with experimental observations, the pellet-triggered ELMs show reduced thermal energy losses and narrower divertor wetted area with respect to spontaneous ELMs. The peak divertor energy fluency is seen to decrease when ELMs are triggered by pellets injected earlier during the pedestal build-up.

physics.plasm-ph↗

arXiv2021

Simulations of COMPASS Vertical Displacement Events with a self-consistent model for halo currents including neutrals and sheath boundary conditions

The understanding of the halo current properties during disruptions is key to design and operate large scale tokamaks in view of the large thermal and electromagnetic loads that they entail. For the first time, we present a fully self-consistent model for halo current simulations including neutral particles and sheath boundary conditions. The model is used to simulate Vertical Displacement Events (VDEs) occurring in the COMPASS tokamak. Recent COMPASS experiments have shown that the parallel halo current density at the plasma-wall interface is limited by the ion saturation current during VDE-induced disruptions. We show that usual MHD boundary conditions can lead to the violation of this physical limit and we implement this current density limitation through a boundary condition for the electrostatic potential. Sheath boundary conditions for the density, the heat flux, the parallel velocity and a realistic parameter choice (e.g. Spitzer $η$ and Spitzer-Härm $χ_\parallel$ values) extend present VDE simulations beyond the state of the art. Experimental measurements of the current density, temperature and heat flux profiles at the COMPASS divertor are compared with the results obtained from axisymmetric simulations. Since the ion saturation current density ($J_{sat}$) is shown to be essential to determine the halo current profile, parametric scans are performed to study its dependence on different quantities such as the plasma resistivity and the particle and heat diffusion coefficients. In this respect, the plasma resistivity in the halo region broadens significantly the $J_{sat}$ profile, increasing the halo width at a similar total halo current.

physics.plasm-ph↗

arXiv2020

Radiation asymmetry and MHD destabilization during the thermal quench after impurity Shattered Pellet Injection

The radiation response and the MHD destabilization during the thermal quench after a mixed species Shattered Pellet Injection (SPI) with impurity species neon and argon are investigated via 3D non-linear MHD simulation using the JOREK code. Both the $n=0$ global current profile contraction and the local helical cooling at each rational surface caused by the pellet fragments are found to be responsible for MHD destabilization after the injection. Significant current driven mode growth is observed as the fragments cross low order rational surfaces, resulting in rapidly inward propagating stochastic magnetic field, ultimately causing the core temperature collapse. The Thermal Quench (TQ) is triggered as the fragments arrive on the $q=1$ or $q=2$ surface depending on the exact $q$ profile and thus mode structure. When injecting from a single toroidal location, strong radiation asymmetry is found before and during the TQ as a result of the unrelaxed impurity density profile along the field line and asymmetric outward heat flux. Such asymmetry gradually relaxes over the course of the TQ, and is entirely eliminated by the end of it. Simulation results indicate that the aforementioned asymmetric radiation behavior could be significantly mitigated by injection from toroidally opposite locations, provided that the time delay between the two injectors is shorter than $1ms$. It is also found that the MHD response are sensitive to the relative timing and injection configuration in these multiple injection cases.

physics.plasm-ph↗

arXiv2020

Non-linear extended MHD simulations of type-I edge localised mode cycles in ASDEX Upgrade and their underlying triggering mechanism

A triggering mechanism responsible for the explosive onset of edge localised modes (ELMs) in fusion plasmas is identified by performing, for the first time, non-linear magnetohydrodynamic simulations of repetitive type-I ELMs. Briefly prior to the ELM crash, destabilising and stabilising terms are affected at different timescales by an increasingly ergodic magnetic field caused by non-linear interactions between the axisymmetric background plasma and growing non-axisymmetric perturbations. The separation of timescales prompts the explosive, i.e. faster than exponential, growth of an ELM crash which lasts ${\sim}$ 500 $μ$s. The duration and size of the simulated ELM crashes compare qualitatively well with type-I ELMs in ASDEX Upgrade. As expected for type-I ELMs, a direct proportionality between the heating power in the simulations and the ELM repetition frequency is obtained. The simulations presented here are a major step forward towards predictive modelling of ELMs and of the assessment of mitigation techniques in ITER and other future tokamaks.

physics.plasm-ph↗

arXiv2020

Understanding the reduction of the edge safety factor during hot VDEs and fast edge cooling events

In the present work a simple analytical approach is presented in order to clarify the physics behind the edge current density behaviour of a hot plasma entering in contact with a resistive conductor. When a plasma enters in contact with a highly resistive wall, large current densities appear at the edge of the plasma. The model shows that this edge current originates from the plasma response, which attempts to conserve the poloidal magnetic flux ($Ψ$) when the outer current is being lost. The loss of outer current is caused by the high resistance of the outer current path compared to the plasma core resistance. The resistance of the outer path may be given by plasma contact with a very resistive structure or by a sudden decrease of the outer plasma temperature (e.g. due to a partial thermal quench or due to a cold front penetration caused by massive gas injection). For general plasma geometries and current density profiles the model shows that given a small change of minor radius ($δa$) the plasma current is conserved to first order ($δI_p = 0 + \mathcal{O}(δa^2)$). This conservation comes from the fact that total inductance remains constant ($δL = 0$) due to an exact compensation of the change of external inductance with the change of internal inductance ($δL_\text{ext}+δL_\text{int} = 0$). As the total current is conserved and the plasma volume is reduced, the edge safety factor drops according to $q_a \propto a^2/I_p$. Finally the consistency of the resulting analytical predictions is checked with the help of free-boundary MHD simulations.

physics.plasm-ph↗

arXiv2019

First predictive simulations for deuterium shattered pellet injection in ASDEX Upgrade

First simulations of deuterium shattered pellet injection (SPI) into an ASDEX Upgrade H-Mode plasma with the JOREK MHD code are presented. Resistivity is increased by one order of magnitude in most simulations to reduce computational costs and allow for extensive parameter scans. The effect of various physical parameters onto MHD activity and thermal quench (TQ) dynamics is studied and the influence of MHD onto ablation is shown. TQs are obtained quickly after injection in most simulations with a typical duration of 100 microseconds, which slows down at lower resistivity. Although the n=1 magnetic perturbation dominates in the simulations, toroidal harmonics up to n=10 contribute to stochastization and stochastic transport in the plasma core. The post-TQ density profile remains hollow for a few hundred microseconds. However, when flux surfaces re-form around the magnetic axis, the density has become monotonic again suggesting a beneficial behaviour for runaway electron avoidance/mitigation. With $10^{21}$ atoms injected, the TQ is typically incomplete and triggered when the shards reach the q=2 rational surface. At a larger number of injected atoms, the TQ can set in even before the shards reach this surface. For low field side injection considered here, repeated formation of outward convection cells is observed in the ablation region reducing material assimilation. Responsible is a sudden rise of pressure in the high density cloud when the stochastic region expands further releasing heat from the hot core. After the TQ, strong sheared poloidal rotation is created by Maxwell stress, which contributes to re-formation of flux surfaces.

physics.plasm-ph↗

arXiv2019

Simulating the nonlinear interaction of relativistic electrons and tokamak plasma instabilities: Implementation and validation of a fluid model

For the simulation of disruptions in tokamak fusion plasmas, a fluid model describing the evolution of relativistic runaway electrons and their interaction with the background plasma is presented. The overall aim of the model is to self-consistently describe the nonlinear coupled evolution of runaway electrons (REs) and plasma instabilities during disruptions. In this model, the runaway electrons are considered as a separate fluid species in which the initial seed is generated through the Dreicer source, which eventually grows by the avalanche mechanism (further relevant source mechanisms can easily be added). Advection of the runaway electrons is considered primarily along field lines, but also taking into account the ExB drift. The model is implemented in the nonlinear magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) code JOREK based on Bezier finite elements, with current coupling to the thermal plasma. Benchmarking of the code with the one-dimensional runaway electron code GO is done using an artificial thermal quench on a circular plasma. As a first demonstration, the code is applied to the problem of an axisymmetric cold vertical displacement event in an ITER plasma, revealing significantly different dynamics between cases computed with and without runaway electrons. Though it is not yet feasible to achieve fully realistic runaway electron velocities close to the speed of light in complete simulations of slowly evolving plasma instabilities, the code is demonstrated to be suitable to study various kinds of MHD-RE interactions in MHD-active and disruption relevant plasmas.

physics.plasm-ph↗

arXiv2019

Non-linear modeling of the threshold between ELM mitigation and ELM suppression by Resonant Magnetic Perturbations in ASDEX Upgrade

The interaction between Edge Localized Modes (ELMs) and Resonant Magnetic Perturbations (RMPs) is modeled with the magnetohydrodynamic code JOREK using experimental parameters from ASDEX Upgrade discharges. The ELM mitigation or suppression is optimal when the amplification of both tearing and peeling-kink responses result in a better RMP penetration. The ELM mitigation or suppression is not only due to the reduction of the pressure gradient, but predominantly arises from the toroidal coupling between the ELMs and the RMP-induced mode at the plasma edge, forcing the edge modes to saturate at a low level. The bifurcation from ELM mitigation to ELM suppression is observed when the RMP amplitude is increased. ELM mitigation is characterized by rotating modes at the edge, while the mode locking to RMPs is induced by the resonant braking of the electron perpendicular flow in the ELM suppression regime.

physics.plasm-ph↗

arXiv2018

Performance analysis and optimization of the JOREK code for many-core CPUs

This report investigates the performance of the JOREK code on the Intel Knights Landing and Skylake processor architectures. The OpenMP scaling of the matrix construction part of the code was analyzed and improved synchronization methods were implemented. A new switch was implemented to control the number of threads used for the linear equation solver independently from other parts of the code. The matrix construction subroutine was vectorized, and the data locality was also improved. These steps led to a factor of two speedup for the matrix construction.

cs.PF↗

arXiv2016

Early evolution of electron cyclotron driven current during suppression of tearing modes in a circular tokamak

When electron cyclotron (EC) driven current is first applied to the inside of a magnetic island, the current spreads throughout the island and after a short period achieves a steady level. Using a two equation fluid model for the EC current that allows us to examine this early evolution in detail, we analyze high-resolution simulations of a 2/1 classical tearing mode in a low-beta large aspect-ratio circular tokamak. These simulations use a nonlinear 3D reduced-MHD fluid model and the JOREK code. During the initial period where the EC driven current grows and spreads throughout the magnetic island, it is not a function of the magnetic flux. However, once it has reached a steady-state, it should be a flux function. We demonstrate numerically that if sufficiently resolved toroidally, the steady-state EC driven current becomes approximately a flux function. We discuss the physics of this early period of EC evolution and its impact on the size of the magnetic island.

physics.plasm-ph↗

arXiv2016

Non-linear modeling of the plasma response to RMPs in ASDEX Upgrade

The plasma response to Resonant Magnetic Perturbations (RMPs) in ASDEX Upgrade is modeled with the non-linear resistive MHD code JOREK, using input profiles that match those of the experiments as closely as possible. The RMP configuration for which Edge Localized Modes are best mitigated in experiments is related to the largest edge kink response observed near the X-point in modeling. On the edge resonant surfaces $q = m/n$, the coupling between the m + 2 kink component and the m resonant component is found to induce the amplification of the resonant magnetic perturbation. The ergodicity and the 3D-displacement near the X-point induced by the resonant amplification can only partly explain the density pumpout observed in experiments.

physics.plasm-ph↗

arXiv2014

Non-linear Simulations of MHD Instabilities in Tokamaks Including Eddy Current Effects and Perspectives for the Extension to Halo Currents

The dynamics of large scale plasma instabilities can strongly be influenced by the mutual interaction with currents flowing in conducting vessel structures. Especially eddy currents caused by time-varying magnetic perturbations and halo currents flowing directly from the plasma into the walls are important. The relevance of a resistive wall model is directly evident for Resistive Wall Modes (RWMs) or Vertical Displacement Events (VDEs). However, also the linear and non-linear properties of most other large-scale instabilities may be influenced significantly by the interaction with currents in conducting structures near the plasma. The understanding of halo currents arising during disruptions and VDEs, which are a serious concern for ITER as they may lead to strong asymmetric forces on vessel structures, could also benefit strongly from these non-linear modeling capabilities. Modeling the plasma dynamics and its interaction with wall currents requires solving the magneto-hydrodynamic (MHD) equations in realistic toroidal X-point geometry consistently coupled with a model for the vacuum region and the resistive conducting structures. With this in mind, the non-linear finite element MHD code JOREK has been coupled with the resistive wall code STARWALL, which allows to include the effects of eddy currents in 3D conducting structures in non-linear MHD simulations. This article summarizes the capabilities of the coupled JOREK-STARWALL system and presents benchmark results as well as first applications to non-linear simulations of RWMs, VDEs, disruptions triggered by massive gas injection, and Quiescent H-Mode. As an outlook, the perspectives for extending the model to halo currents are described.

physics.plasm-ph↗