Reduced electron thermal transport in low collisionality H-mode plasmas in DIII-D and the importance of TEM/ETG-scale turbulence.

The first systematic investigation of core electron thermal transport and the role of local ion temperature gradient/trapped electron mode/electron temperature gradient (ITG/TEM/ETG)-scale core turbulence is performed in high temperature, low collisionality H-mode plasmas in the DIII-D tokamak. Wavenumber spectra of L-mode and H-mode density turbulence are measured by Doppler backscattering. H-mode wavenumber spectra are directly contrasted for the first time with nonlinear gyrokinetic simulation results. Core ITG/TEM-scale turbulence is substantially reduced/suppressed by E × B shear promptly after the L-H transition, resulting in reduced electron thermal transport across the entire minor radius. For small k&thetas;ρs, both experiment and nonlinear gyrokinetic simulations using the GYRO code show density fluctuation levels increasing with k&thetas;ρs in H-mode (r/a = 0.6), in contrast to ITG/TEM-dominated L-mode plasmas. GYRO simulations also indicate that a significant portion of the remaining H-mode electron heat flux results directly from residual intermediate/short-scale TEM/ETG turbulence. Electron transport at substantially increased electron-to-ion temperature ratio (Te/Ti ≥ 1, r/a ≤ 0.35) has been investigated in ECH-assisted, quiescent H-mode plasmas. A synergistic increase in core electron and ion thermal diffusivity (normalized to the gyro-Bohm diffusivity) is found with applied ECH. From linear stability analysis, the TEM mode is expected to become the dominant linear instability with ECH due to increased electron-toion temperature ratio and a reduction in the ion temperature gradient. This is consistent with increased electron temperature fluctuations and core electron thermal diffusivity observed experimentally. The reduced ion temperature gradient likely results from a reduction in the ITG critical gradient due to increased Te/Ti and reduced E ×B shear. These studies are performed at collisonality (ν*e ∼ 0.05, r/a ≤ 0.6) and address transport in electron heat-dominated regimes, thought to be important in ITER due to α-particle heating. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]