The internal transport barrier (ITB) has been obtained in ELMy H-mode plasmas by neutron beam injection and lower hybrid wave heating on the Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST). The ITB structure has been observed in profiles of ion temperature, electron temperature, and electron density within ρ<0.5. It was also observed that the ITB formation is stepwise. Due to the ITB formation, the confinement quality H 98y2 increases from 1 to 1.1 and the normalized beta, β N , increases from 1.5 to near 2. The fishbone activity observed during the ITB phase suggests the central safety factor q(0)∼1. Transport coefficients are calculated by particle balance and power balance analysis, showing an obvious reduction after the ITB formation.

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Effective coupling for lower hybrid waves (LHWs) is achieved by adjusting the launcher position and optimizing the plasma configuration in L-mode in EAST. It is found that, compared with other divertor shapes, the plasma with double null shows better coupling performance at the same position of lower hybrid (LH) grill, especially in the case of a large safety factor near the separatrix (q 95 ) and a large edge recycling (D α ) intensity. The ion cyclotron range of frequency (ICRF) power has a significant impact on LH wave coupling when the ICRF antenna is magnetically connected to the LH grill. The asymmetry effects in the poloidal direction on reflection coefficients are obtained with a low edge density during ICRF power application. The origin of such a relevant asymmetry with ICRF is different from LHWs. Results not only suggest that ICRF power could modify the density in the local scrape-off layer (SOL), but also indicate that density convection in the SOL could be easily obtained with a low edge density. One promising alternative for eliminating the negative impact on LHW coupling induced by ICRF is gas (D2) injection both from the electronic side and ionic side in EAST.

Couplings of lower hybrid wave (LHW) with different divertor configurations are studied in EAST. With an anti-clockwise toroidal magnetic field and similar plasma parameters, experimental results show that the best coupling occurs in the lower single null (LSN) configuration, whereas the worst occurs in the double-null plasma. Furthermore, for the case of clockwise toroidal magnetic field, the coupling of LHW becomes better in the upper single null configuration and worse in the LSN plasma. Such phenomena show that the LHW coupling with different divertor configurations is possibly related to the flux induced by E r × B t and edge recycling intensity represented by D a , where E r is the radial electric field in the scrape-off layer. In addition, various edge-localized modes (ELMs), including its intensity and frequency, have impacts on LHW coupling. With increasing ELM frequency in low edge recycling, the intensity of D a would decrease and the associated coupling of LHW should deteriorate. For the case of comparable edge density, the coupling of LHW is almost not influenced by the ELM crash. Results indicate that the changes among D a intensity, ELM frequency and the reflection coefficients of LHW power are self-consistent. Studies show that by gas puffing the nearby LH grill can improve the coupling of LHW during H-mode in EAST. Meanwhile, it is observed that the frequency of ELM should decrease and the plasma confinement should be improved with proper gas puffing, whereas excessive gas puffing should increase the frequency of ELM during H-mode in the case of good LHW coupling. Results also indicate a degradation in confinement performance at increasing puffing rate.

The frequency spectral broadening of lower hybrid (LH) waves at 2.45 and 4.6 GHz, which denotes the change in original properties of the LH wave, was investigated by using a radio frequency (RF) probe in Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak long-pulse plasmas. The dependency of the RF spectrum on plasma density, LH power and magnetic configuration is reported and analyzed. A link between the degradation of current drive (CD) efficiency and the spectral broadening is found, which shows that the spectral broadening has a negative and significant effect on CD efficiency for both of the LH waves. In addition, the LH power absorption characteristic is also found to be correlated with the LH pump spectral broadening. Parametric instability (PI) modeling was performed to identify the mechanisms responsible for the observed pump broadening and the causal connection between spectral broadening and the loss of CD efficiency. The modeling results show that ion-sound quasimode-driven PI can redistribute the launched parallel refractive index (N // ) spectrum to some extent, thus leading to a pump power depletion. However, the ion-sound quasi-mode-driven PI effect cannot fully account for the experimental observations and the loss of CD efficiency.

The results presented in this paper are an extension of our recent (Kong et al 2012 Plasma Phys. Control. Fusion 54 105003) studies on lower hybrid wave (LHW) coupling. By optimizing the shape of the LH grill, the misalignment between the poloidal limiter (PL) and the LH grill is nearly eliminated and the coupling of LHW is improved, especially on the top row, although some discrepancies are still present in the case with low edge density. Density modifications both by LHW and ion cyclotron range of frequency (ICRF) power are studied in EAST. Experimental results show that the edge density modification in front of the LH grill during LHW power depends mainly on the competition between ponderomotive force (PMF) and the ionization of neutral gas, provided by gas puffing and edge recycling. However, the local edge density during ICRF power can be reduced rapidly. Furthermore, such a modification is more obvious with higher ICRF power and the relevant mechanism of density modification by ICRF power can be related to RF sheaths. In addition, another analogous effect of RF sheaths on the coupling of LHW is also investigated, i.e. the density convection induced by E r × B drift. The changes in LHW coupling associated with different ICRF antennas are discussed and it is shown that in some cases the coupling on the lower rows of the LH grill is improved possibly due to magnetic connection between ICRF antennas and the LH grill. The local coupling of LHW can be improved by gas puffing from gas introduction modules (GIM) on both sides of the launcher, but it is difficult to judge which one is more beneficial due to errors in measurements. Experimental results with gas (D 2 ) injection during ICRF power clearly show that the coupling of LHW on the upper rows will be first improved by gas injection on the electron side and the coupling on the lower rows will be effectively improved by gas injection on the ion side. The results are consistent with the mapping of field lines.