Modeling of ion cyclotron resonance frequency heating of proton-boron plasmas in EHL-2 spherical tokamak

Abstract

Ion cyclotron resonance heating (ICRH) stands out as a widely utilized and cost-effective auxiliary method for plasma heating, bearing significant importance in achieving high-performance discharges in p-¹¹B plasmas. In light of the specific context of p-¹¹B plasma in the EHL-2 device, we conducted a comprehensive scan of the fundamental physical parameters of the antenna using the full-wave simulation program TORIC. Our preliminary result indicated that for p-¹¹B plasma, optimal ion heating parameters include a frequency of 40 MHz, with a high toroidal mode number like to heat the majority H ions. In addition, we discussed the impact of concentration of minority ion species on ion cyclotron resonance heating when ¹¹B serves as the heavy minority species. The significant difference in charge-to-mass ratio between boron and hydrogen ions results in a considerable distance between the hybrid resonance layer and the tow inverted cyclotron resonance layer, necessitating a quite low boron ion concentration to achieve effective minority heating. We also considered another method of direct heating of hydrogen ions in the presence of boron ion minority. It is found that at appropriate boron ion concentrations ( ), the position of the hybrid resonance layer approaches that of the hydrogen ion cyclotron resonance layer, thereby altering the polarization at this position and significantly enhancing hydrogen ion fundamental absorption.