Steady state off-axis sawtoothing in the Rijnhuizen Tokamak project

A family of off-axis, or annular, instabilities has been studied using Thomson scattering, soft X-ray emission, and two electron cyclotron emission diagnostic systems. In the Rijnhuizen tokamak (RTP) [N. J. Lopes Cardozo , Plasma Physics and Controlled Nuclear Fusion Research 1992 (International Atomic Energy Agency, Vienna, 1993), Vol. 1, p. 271] these phenomena are invoked in a controlled way in discharges with specific (off-axis) deposition of electron cyclotron heating (ECH) and persist during most of the heating period, or during many current diffusion times. Based on coherent mode analysis at the crash time, the instabilities are associated with resonant surfaces near simple rational values of q (3/2, 2, and 3). A parameter study shows an increase of reheat rate and a decrease of sawtooth period with increasing ECH power and - in contrast to observations in other experiments - with increasing density as well. (C) 1999 American Institute of Physics. [S1070-664X(99)02210-7]