Characteristics of quasi-single-helicity (QSH) states have been studied in a low-aspect-ratio reversed field pinch (RFP) machine RELAX mainly by magnetic diagnostics. Internal profiles of the fluctuating radial, poloidal and toroidal magnetic fields have shown good agreement with eigenfunctions of a single helical mode. The edge magnetic fluctuation spectra are somewhat broader than what are expected from internal magnetic field profiles. In spite of these slight discrepancies, the usual measure for the QSH, the spectral index N S lower than 2, still provides a reasonable measure for QSH states in RELAX. The QSH persistence has been improved in RELAX by the reduction of the poloidal resistance of flanges at poloidal gaps, mainly due to the improved axisymmetry of the toroidal magnetic field. QSH persistence more than 30% of the flat-topped current phase has been realized with current density lower than in other RFP, and probability of spontaneous QSH is 12.8 ± 7.3% which is higher than high-aspect-ratio RFP. It suggests the advantage of low-aspect-ratio configuration in attaining to the QSH. Comparison with recent experiments using active resonant perturbation may suggest the importance of further reduction of field errors to improve the quality of QSH.
A feedback control system for the stabilization of resistive wall mode (RWM) was applied to a low-aspectratio reversed field pinch (RFP) with minimum power supply capabilities to control the single mode. The system consists of 64 saddle coils (4 and 16 in poloidal and toroidal direction, respectively) in the actuator covering the whole torus on the outer surface of the vacuum vessel. The sensor coils also have the same structure. The saddle coils are connected in series to control the single m/n = 1/2 mode, which has the largest growth rate in RELAX. The radial component of the magnetic field from the sensor coils was suppressed to the preset level and the m/n = 1/2 magnetic mode, which otherwise grows with field penetration time of the vessel, was reduced to 0.1% of the edge poloidal field throughout the discharge. The RFP discharge duration has been extended to ∼3.5 ms, the upper bound determined by the saturation of the iron core. Finally, the MHD control issues in a low-A machine are discussed.
A time-resolved vertical soft X-ray (SXR) imaging system was constructed. To identify the structure of the magnetic island using the obtained SXR images, we calculated the two-dimensional (2-D) image expected from low-aspect-ratio (low-A) reversed field pinch (RFP) plasmas. The 2-D image was found to reflect the change in the radiation power caused by the magnetic island. A preliminary experimental result in which we observed vertical SXR images from the quasi-periodic quasi-single helicity (QSH) state in low-A RFP plasmas is presented. We successfully obtained the time evolution of SXR images from the vertical port. By comparing the observed images with simulated images, we found that the evolution of the experimental SXR image suggests a rotating helical configuration.
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