Development of Negative ION Based NBI System for JT-60U

Development for enhancing the beam characteristics in the N-NBI system for JT-60U has been continued since 1996. In order to increase beam power and duration time, a few countermeasures for improvement of source plasma non-uniformity have been tried. The first is changing arc current limiting resistors for changing arc current distribution, the second is regulating filament temperature for altering arc discharge mode, the third is optimizing a magnetic barrier in arc chamber, and the fourth is blocking the beam acceleration at a strongly non-uniform source plasma area by masking both upper and lower edge of plasma grid. All of these countermeasures have been confirmed to be effective.