Radial electric field shear and poloidal plasma rotation are important factors affecting transport and confinement in tokamaks. Alteration of the electric field and plasma rotation in the vicinity of magnetic islands is also an important factor in tokamak plasma confinement. In the STOR-M tokamak, fast (∼1 ms) simultaneous alterations of the radial electric field, plasma rotation (M || = 0-0.4 in the plasma current direction), floating potential fluctuations in the periphery and MHD activity generated by rotating islands have been observed experimentally during normal ohmic discharges. The observed time and magnitude of the changes depend on the average electron density and poloidal beta at the beginning of the discharge. In discharges with high initial poloidal beta these changes are accompanied by a reduction in H α emission and an increase in the line averaged density. Drastic decreases in H α and increases in line averaged electron density and estimation of poloidal beta suggest that STOR-M confinement is significantly affected in ohmic discharges without an external additional energy input or biasing. MHD activity in STOR-M is damped when a negative electric field is observed at the limiter region of the plasma edge. MHD frequency is observed to decrease with the negative electric field.

Two miniature pinhole camera arrays for spatially and temporally resolved measurements of soft x-ray emission have been designed and installed on the STOR-M tokamak. Each array consists of a photodiode array, with one array viewing vertically and one viewing horizontally through a plasma cross section. Preamplifiers with fixed gains of 10(5) VA and custom built amplifiers with variable gains are used for signal amplification. Digitizers with 14 bit resolution and 3 MSs sampling rate are used for data acquisition. In the initial operation, an Al foil with a thickness of 1.8 microm installed for one array and Be filter of 7.6 microm installed for the other array are used to test signal strength. Initial tests have identified sawtooth oscillations and 20 kHz fluctuations, which are also detected by Mirnov coils, superimposed on the sawtooth oscillations.

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