Experimental study of electron temperature fluctuations in the DIII-D tokamak

The study of anomalous transport caused by turbulence in plasmas is an important aspect of magnetic fusion energy research. The importance of long-wavelength, electron temperature fluctuations in determining electron heat transport remains an open question. In this work, experiments were carried out to investigate the transport relevance of electron temperature fluctuations at the DIII-D tokamak using a radiometer-based, Correlation Electron Cyclotron Emission (CECE) diagnostic. The measurements of electron temperature fluctuations at DIII-D have provided the unique opportunity to quantitatively compare simultaneously measured electron temperature and density fluctuations with predictions from nonlinear gyrokinetic simulations. Experimentally, it is observed that the profiles of the two fields are similar in amplitude and spectrum in neutral beam-heated, low-confinement mode (L-mode) plasmas where the Ion Temperature Gradient (ITG) mode is expected to be the dominant linear instability. It is also observed that electron temperature fluctuations in the core plasma are reduced in high-confinement mode (H-mode), correlated with improved confinement. When Electron Cyclotron Heating (ECH) is used to modify profiles in neutral beam-heated L-mode plasmas, it is observed that the ratio of electron temperature and density fluctuation amplitudes increases, while theory predicts that the changes in the profiles will result in an increase in the Trapped Electron Mode (TEM) drive. The simultaneously measured profiles of electron temperature and density fluctuations in neutral beam-heated L-mode plasmas are compared with predictions from local, nonlinear gyrokinetic simulations using the GYRO code. The GYRO predictions are in good agreement with experimental observations of transport levels and fluctuation levels at one core location. GYRO predicts that electron temperature fluctuations are out of phase with potential fluctuations (non-Boltzmann response) and will contribute substantially to anomalous heat transport. However, the local simulations do not reproduce the observed trend that relative fluctuation levels of electron temperature and density increase with radius. This disagreement shows that measurements of multi-field fluctuations at multiple radial locations can be used to provide a critical test of advanced, nonlinear gyrokinetic turbulence simulations.