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Measuring the time variation of the wavenumber spectrum of turbulence is important for understanding the characteristics of high-temperature plasmas, and the application of a Doppler reflectometer with simultaneous multi-frequency sources is expected. To implement this diagnostic in future fusion devices, the use of a phased array antenna (PAA) that can scan microwave beams without moving antennas is recommended. Since the frequency-scanning waveguide leaky-wave antenna-type PAA has a complex structure, we have investigated its characteristics by modeling it with 3D metal powder additive manufacturing (AM). First, a single waveguide is fabricated to understand the characteristics of 3D AM techniques, and it is clear that there are differences in performance depending on the direction of manufacture and surface treatment. Then, a PAA is made, and it is confirmed that the beam can be emitted in any direction by frequency scanning. The plasma flow velocity can be measured by applying the 3D manufacturing PAA to plasma measurement.

A heavy ion beam probe (HIBP) has been designed for the QUEST spherical tokamak to measure plasma turbulence and the profiles of electric potential profiles. Using a cesium ion beam with an energy of several 10 keV, the observable region covers most of the upper half of the plasma. Although the probe beam is deflected by the poloidal magnetic field produced by plasma current and poloidal coil currents, it can be detected under plasma current up to 150 kA by modifying the trajectories with two electrostatic sweepers. According to the numerical estimation of the intensity of the detected beam, sufficient signal intensity for measuring plasma turbulence can be obtained over almost the measurable area when the electron density is up to 1 × 1019 m−3, which is larger than the cut-off density of electron cyclotron heating in QUEST. The performance of the designed HIBP is sufficient to explore the mechanisms of heat and particle transport in magnetically confined plasmas, including the influence of plasma wall interactions, which is a goal of the QUEST project.

Electron cyclotron emission (ECE) imaging diagnostics incorporating a lensless approach have been developed for measurements involving active spatial selectivity and direction-of-arrival estimation. The Capon method for adaptive-array analysis was proposed to improve the spatial resolution of the two-dimensional ECE imaging technique. Broadband noise source emissions were used to simulate the ECE to verify the practical effectiveness of the Capon method in the ECE imaging. Multiple noise source emission positions were properly estimated with a high spatial resolution using the Capon method.

The local structures of 122-type paradium arsenides, namely BaPd2As2 and SrPd2As2, are examined by As K-edge extended x-ray absorption fine structure measurements to find a possible correlation between the variation of their superconducting transition temperature and the local structure. The local atomic distances are found to be consistent with average distances measured by diffraction techniques. The temperature dependence of mean square relative displacements reveal that, while BaPd2As2 is characterized by a local As-Pd soft mode, albeit with larger atomic disorder, SrPd2As2 shows anomalous As-Pd correlations with a kink at similar to 160 K due to hardening by raising temperature. We have discussed implications of these results and possible mechanisms of differing superconducting transition temperature in relation with the structural instability.

Electron Cyclotron Resonance Heating (ECRH) has contributed to the achievement of high performance plasma production, high electron temperature plasmas and sustainment of steady-state plasmas in the Large Helical Device (LHD). Our immediate targets of upgrading the ECRH system are 5 MW several seconds and 1 MW longer than one hour power injection into LHD. The improvement will greatly extend the plasma parameter regime. For that purpose, we have been promoting the development and installation of 77 GHz/1-1.5 MW/several seconds and 0.3 MW/CW gyrotrons in collaboration with University of Tsukuba. The transmission lines are re-examined and improved for high and CW power transmission. In the recent experimental campaign, two 77 GHz gyrotrons were operated. One more gyrotron, which was designed for 1.5 MW/2 s output, was constructed and is tested. We have been promoting to improve total ECRH efficiency for efficient gyrotron-power use and efficient plasma heating, e.g. a new waveguide alignment method and mode-content analysis and the feedback control of the injection polarization. In the last experimental campaign, the 77 GHz gyrotrons were used in combination with the existing 84 GHz range and 168 GHz gyrotrons. Multi-frequency ECRH system is more flexible in plasma heating experiments and diagnostics. A lot of experiments have been performed in relation to high electron temperature plasmas by realization of the core electron-root confinement (CERC), electron cyclotron current drive (ECCD), Electron Bernstein Wave heating, and steady-state plasma sustainment. Some of the experimental results are briefly described. © 2009 American Institute of Physics.

A remote steering antenna was recently developed for electron cyclotron heating and current drive (ECH/ECCD) experiments on the TRIAM-1M tokamak. This is the first application of the remote steering antenna concept for ECH/ECCD experiments, which have conditions relevant to the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER). Fundamental ECH and ECCD experiments were conducted in the ITER frequency from the low field using this antenna system. In addition to the angles near 0°, the launcher was a symmetric direction antenna with an extended steering-angle capability of ±(8°–19°). The output beam from the antenna was a well-defined Gaussian with a proper steering angle. The Gaussian content and the steering-angle accuracy were 0.85 and −0.5°, respectively. The high power tests measured the antenna transmission efficiency at 0.90–0.94. The efficiencies obtained in the low and high power tests were consistent with the calculations using higher-order modes. In order to excite the pure O/X-modes in the oblique injection, two polarizers were used to control the elliptical polarization of the incident beam for the ECCD experiments. The fundamental O/X-mode ECH/ECCD was applied to lower hyrid current drive plasmas at the optimized incident polarization. In the X-mode experiment, at medium density (~1 × 1019 m−3), clear differences in the plasma current and the hard x-ray intensity were observed between the co- and counter-steering injections due to the ECCD effect on the coupling of forward fast electrons.

Two types of improved core confinement were observed during centrally focused electron cyclotron heating (ECH) into plasmas sustained by counter (CNTR) and Co neutral beam injections (NBI) in the Large Helical Device. The CNTR NBI plasma displayed transition phenomena to the high-electron-temperature state and had a clear electron internal transport barrier, while the Co NBI plasma did not show a clear transition or an ECH power threshold but showed broad high temperature profiles with moderate temperature gradient. This indicated that the Co NBI plasma with additional ECH also had an improved core confinement. The electron heat transport characteristics of these plasmas were directly investigated using heat pulse propagation excited by modulated ECH. These effects appear to be related to the m/n = 2/1 rational surface or the island induced by NBI beam-driven current.

This paper reports on the results of an experimental investigation into electron cyclotron resonance heating (ECRH) using the fundamental O-mode in the large helical device (LHD). The aim of the experiment is to understand the mechanism of the selective excitation of the O-mode EC wave and, thereby, optimize the performance of the ECRH. The polarization angle and the ellipticity of the electric field of the incident high power millimetre waves were varied in the experiment using a pair of grating polarizers. The responses of the plasma stored energy and electron temperature were measured to evaluate the effects. The optimum values of the polarization angle and the ellipticity for the ECRH were identified experimentally. A simple model of power branching between the O- and X-modes is introduced in order to interpret the observed experimental results. Specific to the ECRH in the LHD configuration, the effect of magnetic shear in the plasma peripheral region is considered.

Significant progress has been made with ion cyclotron range of frequencies (ICRF) heating in the Large Helical Device. This is mainly due to better confinement of the helically trapped particles and less accumulation of impurities in the region of the plasma core. During the past two years, ICRF heating power has been increased from 1.35 to 2.7 MW. Various wave-mode tests were carried out using minority-ion heating, second-harmonic heating, slow-wave heating and high-density fast-wave heating at the fundamental cyclotron frequency. This fundamental heating mode extended the plasma density range of effective ICRF heating to a value of 1×1020 m−3. This use of the heating mode was its first successful application in large fusion devices. Using the minority-ion mode gave the best performance, and the stored energy reached 240 kJ using ICRF alone. This was obtained for the inward-shifted magnetic axis configuration. The improvement associated with the axis-shift was common for both bulk plasma and highly accelerated particles. For the minority-ion mode, high-energy ions up to 500 keV were observed by concentrating the heating power near the plasma axis. The confinement properties of high-energy particles were studied for different magnetic axis configurations, using the power-modulation technique. It confirmed that with the inward-shifted configuration the confinement of high-energy particles was better than with the normal configuration. By increasing the distance of the plasma to the vessel wall to about 2 cm, the impurity influx was sufficiently reduced to allow sustainment of the plasma with ICRF heating alone for more than 2 min.

Internal transport barriers with respect to electron thermal transport (eITB) were observed in the large helical device, when the electron cyclotron resonance heating (ECH) power was highly localized on the centre of a plasma sustained by neutral beam injection. The eITB is characterized by a high central electron temperature of 6–8 keV with an extremely steep gradient, as high as 55 keV m−1 and a low electron thermal diffusivity within a normalized average radius ρ≈0.3 as well as by the existence of clear thresholds for the ECH power and plasma collisionality.

The behaviour of high-energy ions accelerated by an ion cyclotron range of frequency (ICRF) electric field in the large helical device (LHD) is discussed. A better confinement performance of high-energy ions in the inward-shifted magnetic axis configuration was experimentally verified by measuring their energy spectrum and comparing it with the effective temperature determined by an electron slowing down process. In the standard magnetic axis configuration a saturation of the measured tail temperature was observed as the effective temperature was increased. The ratio between these two quantities is a measure of the quality of transfer efficiency from high-energy ions to a bulk plasma; when this efficiency was compared with Monte Carlo simulations the results agreed fairly well. The ratio of the stored energy of the high-energy ions to that of the bulk plasma was measured using an ICRF heating power modulation method; it was deduced from phase differences between total and bulk plasma stored energies and the modulated ICRF heating power. The measured high energy fraction agreed with that calculated using the injected ICRF heating power, the transfer efficiency determined in the experiment and the confinement scaling of the LHD plasma.

Ion temperature at the plasma centre has been measured from Doppler broadening of Ti XXI (2.61 A) and Ar XVII (3.95 A) x-ray lines using a newly installed crystal spectrometer with CCD detector in ECH, NBI and ICRF plasmas of Large Helical Device (LHD). The ion temperature obtained in a range of 0.6 and 3.5 keV was analysed with electron density and compared with electron temperature. A new parameter range of Ti>Te was found in low-density (ne

In LHD discharges, the NBI heated plasmas are terminated in two ways: (a) thermal decay (TD) after the termination of NBI and (b) radiative collapse (RC) during the NBI heating. The basic characteristics of the TD and RC discharges are compared. It is found that the decay and collapse of the plasma are mainly governed by the heating power and the plasma density. The critical density c for the collapse of RC plasmas is similar to the scaling laws obtained in other helical devices, i.e. c∝(PB/V)0.5, where P, B and V denote heating power, magnetic field and plasma volume, respectively. Moreover, measurements using multichannel bolometric diagnostics indicate that the total radiation profiles in TD and RC plasmas are usually inboard-outboard symmetric and asymmetric, respectively, at the end of the discharge. In RC discharges, the total radiation profile develops in several phases. Before the onset of the thermal instability (TI), the radiation profile is rather symmetric, while after that, the radiation profile evolves from being symmetric in the initial period towards being asymmetric eventually with high radiation on the inboard side. Corresponding variations are shown in the time evolutions of the density and temperature profiles, and a substantial contraction of the plasma column is observed immediately after TI onset. The spatial and temporal coincidence of the asymmetries in the radiation, density and temperature is similar to that observed with multifaceted asymmetric radiation from the edge (MARFE) in tokamaks. But, unlike MARFEs, the asymmetric radiation (AR) in LHD is rather transient since it appears just before the end of RC discharges. The underlying cause for the development of radiation asymmetry was investigated and compared with existing instability models. The result suggests that the high inboard radiation is a manifestation of an enhanced local thermal instability, and the AR results from asymmetric developments of TI on the inboard-outboard sides during the final stage of RC discharges.

The experimentally optimized magnetic field configuration of the Large Helical Device [A. Iiyoshi et al., Nucl. Fusion 39, 1245 (1999)], where the magnetic axis is shifted inward by 15 cm from the early theoretical prediction, reveals 50% better global energy confinement than the prediction of the scaling law. This configuration has been investigated further from the viewpoints of high energy particle confinement and magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) stability. The confinement of high energy ions is improved as expected. The minority heating of ion cyclotron range of frequency was successful and the heating efficiency was improved by the inward shift. The confinement of passing particles by neutral beam injection was also improved under low magnetic field strength, and there could be obtained an almost steady high beta discharge up to 3% in volume average. This was a surprising result because the observed pressure gradient exceeded the Mercier unstable limit. The observed MHD activities became as high as beta but they did not grow enough to deteriorate the confinement of high energy ions or the performance of the bulk plasma, which was still 50% better than the scaling. According to these favorable results, better performance would be expected by increasing the heating power because the neoclassical transport can also be improved there.

During the first two years of the LHD experiment the following results have been achieved: (i) higher Te (Te(0) = 4.4 keV at ne = 5.3 × 1018 m-3 and Pabs = 1.8 MW); (ii) higher confinement (τE = 0.3 s, Te(0) = 1.1 keV at ne = 6.5 × 1019 m-3 and Pabs = 2.0 MW); (iii) higher stored energy, Wpdia = 880 kJ at B = 2.75 T. High performance plasmas have been realized in the inward shifted magnetic axis configuration (R = 3.6 m) where helical symmetry is recovered and the particle orbit properties are improved by a trade-off of MHD stability properties due to the appearance of a magnetic hill. Energy confinement was systematically higher than that predicted by the International Stellarator Scaling 95 by up to a factor of 1.6 and was comparable with the ELMy H mode confinement capability in tokamaks. This confinement improvement is attributed to configuration control (inward shift of the magnetic axis) and to the formation of a high edge temperature. The average beta value achieved reached 2.4% at B = 1.3 T, the highest beta value ever obtained in a helical device, and so far no degradation of confinement by MHD phenomena has been observed. The inward shifted configuration has also led to successful ICRF minority ion heating. ICRF powers up to 1.3 MW were reliably injected into the plasma without significant impurity contamination, and a plasma with a stored energy of 200 kJ was sustained for 5 s by ICRF alone. As another important result, long pulse discharges of more than 1 min were successfully achieved separately with an NBI heating of 0.5 MW and with an ICRF heating of 0.85 MW.

The confinement characteristics of large net-current-free plasmas heated by neutral-beam injection have been investigated in the Large Helical Device (LHD). A systematic enhancement in energy-confinement times from the scaling derived from the medium-sized heliotron/torsatron experiments have been observed, which is attributed to the edge pedestal. The core confinement is scaled with the Bohm term divided by the square root of the gyro radii. The comparative analysis using a dimensionally similar discharge in the Compact Helical System indicates gyro-Bohm dependence in the core and transport improvement in the edge region of LHD plasmas.

Particle confinement time {tau}{sub p} has been obtained from measurements of poloidal and toroidal distributions of H{alpha} and Lyman {alpha} emissions in CHS. These particle confinement times range between 1.5 and 4ms at a constant line-averaged density of 3 x 10{sup 13}cm{sup -3} for both cases of limiter- and divertor-dominated NBI plasmas with Ti-gettering. In these cases the energy confinement time {tau}{sub E} were between 2 and 3ms. The density decay characteristic time {tau}{sub p}{sup *} and global recycling coefficient R have been also measured for Ti-gettered plasmas and large {tau}{sub p}{sup *} values were observed. As a result high recycling rates (R>0.92) are obtained for a wide density range. For a limiter-dominated case of boronized plasmas (R{sub ax}=92.1cm) values of {tau}{sub p} were correlated with {tau}{sub E} and a linear correlation between them was found for normalized {tau}{sub E} to P{sup -0.58} which is a power degradation term in LHD empirical scaling. 6 refs., 9 figs.

Measurement of the Electron Cyclotron Emission (ECE) spectrum is one of the most popular electron temperature diagnostics in nuclear fusion plasma research. A 2-dimensional ECE imaging system was developed with an adaptive-array approach. A radio-frequency (RF) heterodyne detection system with Software Defined Radio (SDR) devices and a phased-array receiver antenna was used to measure the phase and amplitude of the ECE wave. The SDR heterodyne system could continuously measure the phase and amplitude with sufficient accuracy and time resolution while the previous digitizer system could only acquire data at specific times. Robust streaming phase measurements for adaptive-arrayed continuous ECE diagnostics were demonstrated using Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) analysis with the SDR system. The emission field pattern was reconstructed using adaptive-array analysis. The reconstructed profiles were discussed using profiles calculated from coherent single-frequency radiation from the phase array antenna.

The bootstrap current and electron thermal conductivity have been investigated in ECRH plasmas on the CHS heliotron/torsatron. The neoclassical transport coefficients have been externally controlled over a wide range by changing the ellipticity of the plasma cross-section. While local thermal conductivity, as well as global confinement, have shown inconsistency with the neoclassical predictions, the observed toroidal net current has been successfully explained by considering the three dimensional geometry with the available neoclassical theory. The present experimental results indicate that the transport parallel to the magnetic field lines (bootstrap current) is likely to be neoclassical but that the perpendicular transport (thermal conductivity) is anomalous, which is common in current less plasmas as well as tokamaks

The phased‐array antenna system for Electron Cyclotron/Bernstein Wave Heating and Current Drive experiments has been developed in the QUEST. The antenna was designed to excite a pure O‐mode wave in the oblique injection for the O‐X‐B mode conversion experiments, and its good performances were confirmed at a low power level. The plasma current (

75歳以上の高齢者大腸癌穿孔例の臨床・病理学的特徴を75歳未満の穿孔例と比較検討した.手術数に占める穿孔率は75歳未満3.0%に対して, 75歳以上では19.4%と高率であった.口側遊離穿孔の頻度は75歳未満では4例中1例 (25.0%) に対し, 75歳以上では6例中3例 (50.0%) であった.穿孔癌の占居部位は75歳未満では下部大腸に集中していたが, 高齢者では大腸に広く分布していた.癌の肉眼型はともに2型が75%以上を占め, 壁深達度は高齢者に浅い傾向をみた.ショック症状は75歳未満50.0%, 75歳以上33.3%であり, 直死4例中3例はショック症状を伴っていた.発症から手術までに24時間以上経過した症例は高齢者で66.6%と高率であったが, 経過時間と直死率に相関はなかった.術前併存疾患と術後合併症は高齢者で高率に発生し, これらの症例は高い直死率を示した.

過去12年間に当科で手術した大腸癌272例のうち, 75歳以上の高齢者大腸癌47例の臨床病理学的特徴について75歳以下 (対照群) と比較検討し, 以下の結論を得た. (1) 最近6年間の高齢者大腸癌の手術率は22.8%と, それ以前の11.0%よりも上昇した (p 0.05), 肉眼型, 腫瘍径, 組織型, 壁深達度, Dukes 分類, リンパ転移率, 脈管浸襲率には対照群と差がなかった. (3) 切除率, 治癒切除率は両群間で差はなかったが, 高齢者の直死率は14.9%と対照群の4.0%より高率であった (P

過去14年間の大腸癌切除266例のうち, sm癌8例 (3.0%), pm癌11例 (4.1%) の臨床病理学的特徴と予後について検討した.占居部位はsm癌7例 (87.5%), pm癌8例 (72.7%) がS以下の大腸にあり, 両癌ともに血便・下血の頻度が50.0%以上を占めた.高分化腺癌はsm癌7例 (87.5%), pm癌7例 (63.6%) であった.sm癌は腫瘍径20mm以下6例 (75.0%), 隆起型5例 (62.5%) であった。pm癌の平均腫瘍径は39mmであった.sm癌では全例v0であったが, 1例 (12.5%) にly2, n2 (+) を認めた.pm癌ではv1 18.2%, v3 9.1%, ly1 27.3%, ly3 18.2%, n1 (+) 18.2%, n2 (+) 9.1%であった.sm癌では浸潤度が増すほどリンパ節転移の可能性があり, sm3はR2の術式が妥当と考えた.

直腸癌治癒切除 (40例) 後の局所再発8例 (20%) の臨床病理学的特徴, 予後などにつき検討した.再発までの平均期間は22カ月で, 部位別の再発率はRs18.8%, Ra20.0%, Rb22.2%であった.3型での再発率が6%と高率で, また局在部位では腫瘍中心部が前壁にある例での再発率が高かった.腫瘍最大径6.0cm以上で46.7%に, 周径2/3周以上で50.0%に再発を認めた (p

In the report, a backward wave oscillator (-100 GHz) was used as a local oscillator. In this work, a fast-switching local oscillator part in lower frequency range was built for higher time resolution. The lower frequency becomes wide-band in millimeter-wave range (-100 GHz) using millimeter multipliers. The local-frequency part plays an important role to determine the frequency switching-time, step-width and total range in the ECE measuremt. The frequency switching of the lower local-frequency part is mainly discussed in this report.

To study polarized radiative transfer of electron cyclotron waves, a general equation of polarization evolution that includes the effects of both birefringence and dichroism is dealt with. Full Stokes parameters are used to describe the polarization state and the absorption rate in the equation. The evolution equation on polarization state is able to treat general cases in which two polarization states of eigenmodes are not necessary to be orthogonal. Using this equation, a single absorption rate in second harmonic electron cyclotron heating is investigated on the Large Helical Device.

The confinement characteristics of large net-current-free plasmas heated by neutral-beam injection have been investigated in the Large Helical Device (LHD). A systematic enhancement in energy-confinement times from the scaling derived from the medium-sized heliotron/torsatron experiments have been observed, which is attributed to the edge pedestal. The core confinement is scaled with the Bohm term divided by the square root of the gyro radii. The comparative analysis using a dimensionally similar discharge in the Compact Helical System indicates gyro-Bohm dependence in the core and transport improvement in the edge region of LHD plasmas.

In LHD discharges a significant enhancement of the global energy confinement has been achieved for the first time in a helical device with an edge thermal barrier, which exhibits a sharp gradient at the edge of the temperature profile. Key features associated with the barrier are quite different from those seen in tokamaks: (i) almost no change in particle (including impurity) transport, (ii) a gradual formation of the barrier, (iii) a very high ratio of the edge temperature to the average temperature, and (iv) no edge relaxation phenomenon. These features are very attractive in applying the thermal barrier to future reactor grade devices.

Role of platelet activating factor (PAF) on the formation of rat ischemic colitis was investigated. High incidence of the formation of ischemic colitis was observed after ligation of marginal vessels of the rat with stricture of the rectum, however, administration of PAF-inhibitor (TCV) decreased incidence of the lesion. Only the lesion in the mucosa occurred after clamping of the marginal vessels of the rat with stricture of the rectum and administration of TCV did not affect the incidence of the lesion. In conclusion, the etiological involvement of PAF on deterioration of the ischemic colitis was suspected.

Preventive effect of dopamine on stress ulcer formation was investigated in rats. Dopamine 1-10 micrograms/kg/min suppressed the elevation of ulcer index significantly after water immersion and restraint stress in a dose-dependent fashion, however ulcer indices of 25 micrograms/kg/min of dopamine were higher than 10 micrograms/kg/min. Dopamine 1-10 micrograms/kg/min suppressed the decrease of gastric mucosal blood flow, gastric mucosal prostaglandin E2 content and gastric transmucosal potential difference during stress loading in a dose-dependent manner, although the suppression of them in 25 micrograms/kg/min of dopamine was smaller than in 10 micrograms/kg/min also. Dopamine suppressed the increase of gastric acid secretion and gastric motility during stress loading in a dose-dependent fashion up to 25 micrograms/kg/min. These results indicates that dopamine suppresses the formation of stress ulcer by increasing defensive factors and decreasing aggressive factors.