The impact of magnetic shear on the dynamics of a seeded 3D filament in slab geometry

• Main Authors: W.A. Gracias, P. Tamain, E. Serre, R.A. Pitts, L. García
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier 2017-08-01
• Series: Nuclear Materials and Energy
• Online Access: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352179116302800

Seeded filament simulations are used to study blob dynamics with the state-of-the-art TOKAM3X fluid code in the scrape-off layer (SOL) using a slab geometry. The filamentary dynamics recovered with the code are compared with previously predicted analytical blob velocity scalings while also studying the effect of field line pitch angle on these dynamics and are found to be similar. The effect of changing magnetic topology on filamentary motion is also investigated. Magnetic shear is introduced in the model by the sudden and localised variation of field line pitch angle for a narrow radially located region constituting effectively a shearing zone. Three such shear zones are tested to see how they affect filament motion. Filaments are initialised radially upstream from the shear zone and recorded as they convect towards the far-SOL side. The lowest intensity shear zone allows many of the higher amplitude filaments to pass through after dampening them. On the other hand, the highest intensity shear zones prevent all filaments from progressing to the wall beyond the shear zone and, in certain cases for high density amplitude filaments, is able to generate a new filament downstream from the shear zone.