CLOSED LOOP SAWTOOTH PERIOD CONTROL USING VARIABLE ECCD INJECTION ANGLES ON TORE SUPRA

Closed loop control of the period of fast ion stabilized sawtooth has been demonstrated for the first time on Tore Supra by varying the electron cyclotron current drive (ECCD) injection angles in real time. Fast ions generated by up to 4 MW of central ion cyclotron resonance heating (ICRH) increased the sawtooth period from the ohmic value of 25 ms to 60 to 100 ms. This sawtooth period was reduced to 30 ms by the addition of only 300 kW of ECCD. In ICRH heated shots where the normalized minor radius of the ECCD absorption location was swept from 0.4 to 0.05 in 4 s, the sawtooth period showed an abrupt change from 70 to 30 ms when the ECCD deposition normalized minor radius reached similar to 0.2. This short period was then maintained until the absorption location moved well inside the sawtooth inversion radius at which point it abruptly returned to 70 ins. A closed loop controller was implemented that allowed the sawtooth period to be switched in real time between short and long sawteeth with a response time of the order of 1 s.