[en] There have been significant developments in supplementary plasma heating systems over the past few years. Neutral beam heating has evolved from a new concept to a proven technique. Various types of rf heating have been tested. The present technological and experimental status of auxiliary heating techniques in tokamaks, mirrors, and pinches is reviewed. The possibility that these techniques can be extrapolated to fusion reactors is examined

[en] This discussion covers the following three papers: (1) magnetic islandography in tokamaks, (2) scaling laws for energy lifetimes in tokamaks, and (3) simulation of discharge dynamics in tokamaks

[en] The research performed under this grant over the current 11-1/2 month period has concentrated on key tokamak plasma confinement and heating theory issues: extensions of neoclassical MHD; viscosity coefficients and transport; nonlinear resistive MHD simulations of Tokapole II plasmas; ICRF and edge plasma interactions; energy confinement degradation due to macroscopic phenomena; and coordination of a new transport initiative. Progress and publications in these areas are briefly summarized in this report. 21 refs

[en] The research on this contract over the past year has concentrated on some key tandem mirror confinement and heating issues (barrier trapping current, rf heating, low mode number stability) and on developing a comprehensive neoclassical transport theory for nonaxisymmetric toroidal plasmas (e.g., stellarators). Progress in these and some other miscellaneous areas are summarized briefly in this progress report

[en] The research performed under this contract over the current 15 month period has concentrated on some key Phaedrus tandem mirror plasma confinement and heating issues (ambipolar potential formation due to ICRF, second harmonic ECH, ponderomotive force effects, drift-pumping calculations, moment approach to transport), on development of tokamak neoclassical MHD theory (equations, instabilities, transport), and on some tokamak-specific topics (ballooning modes on a divertor separatrix, equilibrium and resistive evolution codes for Tokapole II). Progress in these and some other miscellaneous areas are briefly summarized in this final progress report for this contract, which is to evolve into a special research grant in the future

No abstract available

[en] The moment equation approach to neoclassical-type processes is used to derive the flows, currents and resistive MHD-like equations for studying equilibria and instabilities in axisymmetric tokamak plasmas operating in the banana-plateau collisionality regime (ν* approx. 1). The resultant ''neoclassical MHD'' equations differ from the usual reduced equations of resistive MHD primarily by the addition of the important viscous relaxation effects within a magnetic flux surface. The primary effects of the parallel (poloidal) viscous relaxation are: (1) Rapid (approx. ν/sub i/) damping of the poloidal ion flow so the residual flow is only toroidal; (2) addition of the bootstrap current contribution to Ohm's laws; and (3) an enhanced (by B²/B/sub theta/²) polarization drift type term and consequent enhancement of the perpendicular dielectric constant due to parallel flow inertia, which causes the equations to depend only on the poloidal magnetic field B/sub theta/. Gyroviscosity (or diamagnetic vfiscosity) effects are included to properly treat the diamagnetic flow effects. The nonlinear form of the neoclassical MHD equations is derived and shown to satisfy an energy conservation equation with dissipation arising from Joule and poloidal viscous heating, and transport due to classical and neoclassical diffusion

[en] A phenomenological procedure of separating velocity space into various regions of collisionality (banana, plateau, boundary layer), calculating the perturbed distribution functions accordingly, and appropriately averaging over velocity space, is used to analytically reproduce neoclassical diffusion and facilitate investigation of dissipative trapped-electron modes in this important transition regime. (U.S.)

[en] The research performed under this grant during the current year has concentrated on key tokamak plasma confinement and heating theory issues: further development of neoclassical MHD; development of a new fluid/kinetic hybrid model; energy confinement degradation due to macroscopic phenomena in tokamaks; and some other topics (magnetics analysis, coherent structures, presheath structure). Progress and publications in these areas are briefly summarized in this report. 20 refs

[en] The Transport Task Force (TTF) was initiated as a broad-based US magnetic fusion community activity during the fall of 1988 to focus attention on and encourage development of an increased understanding of anomalous transport in tokamaks. The overall TTF goal is to make progress on Characterizing, Understanding and Identifying how to Reduce plasma transport in tokamaks -- to CUIR transport