Using recently developed adjoint methods for computing the shape derivatives of functions that depend on MHD equilibria (Antonsen et al. 2019; Paul et al. 2020), we present the first example of analytic gradient-based optimization of fixed-boundary stellarator equilibria. We take advantage of gradient information to optimize figures of merit of relevance for stellarator design, including the rotational transform, magnetic well, and quasisymmetry near the axis. With the application of the adjoint method, we reduce the number of equilibrium evaluations by the dimension of the optimization space ($\sim 50-500$) in comparison with a finite-difference gradient-based method. We discuss regularization objectives of relevance for fixed-boundary optimization, including a novel method that prevents self-intersection of the plasma boundary. We present several optimized equilibria, including a vacuum field with very low magnetic shear throughout the volume.
Analytic solutions of the magnetohydrodynamic equilibrium equations for a cylindrically symmetric magnetically confined plasma with reversed magnetic shear, s < 0, and sheared flow are constructed by prescribing the safety factor-, poloidal velocity- and axial velocity- profiles consistently with experimental ones.
We demonstrate a fast adjoint-based method to optimize tokamak and stellarator equilibria against a pressure-driven instability known as the infinite-$n$ ideal ballooning mode. We present three finite-$β$ (the ratio of thermal to magnetic pressure) equilibria: one tokamak equilibrium and two stellarator equilibria that are unstable against the ballooning mode. Using the self-adjoint property of ideal MHD, we construct a technique to rapidly calculate the change in the growth rate, a measure of ideal ballooning instability. Using the~\texttt{SIMSOPT} framework, we then implement our fast adjoin…
We identify and discuss a family of azimuthally symmetric, incompressible, magnetohydrodynamic plasma equilibria with poloidal and toroidal flows in terms of solutions of the Generalized Grad Shafranov (GGS) equation. These solutions are derived by exploiting the incompressibility assumption, in order to rewrite the GGS equation in terms of a different dependent variable, and the continuous Lie symmetry properties of the resulting equation and in particular a special type of "weak" symmetries.
We take a careful look at two approaches to deriving stability criteria for ideal MHD equilibria. One is based on a tedious analysis of the linearized equations of motion, while the other examines the second variation of the MHD Hamiltonian computed with proper variational constraints. For equilibria without flow, the two approaches are known to be fully consistent. However, for equilibria with flow, the stability criterion obtained from the constrained variation approach was claimed to be stronger than that derived using the linearized equations of motion. We show this claim is incorrect by d…
Simulated annealing (SA) is applied for three-dimensional (3D) equilibrium calculation of ideal, low-beta reduced MHD in cylindrical geometry. The SA is based on the theory of Hamiltonian mechanics. The dynamical equation of the original system, low-beta reduced MHD in this study, is modified so that the energy changes monotonically while preserving the Casimir invariants in the artificial dynamics. An equilibrium of the system is given by an extremum of the energy, therefore SA can be used as a method for calculating ideal MHD equilibrium. Previous studies demonstrated that the SA succeeds to…
The Hamiltonian structure of ideal translationally symmetric extended MHD (XMHD) is obtained by employing a method of Hamiltonian reduction on the three-dimensional noncanonical Poisson bracket of XMHD. The existence of the continuous spatial translation symmetry allows the introduction of Clebsch-like forms for the magnetic and velocity fields. Upon employing the chain rule for functional derivatives, the 3D Poisson bracket is reduced to its symmetric counterpart. The sets of symmetric Hall, Inertial, and extended MHD Casimir invariants are identified, and used to obtain energy-Casimir variat…
In ideal MHD, the magnetic flux is advected by the plasma motion, freezing flux-surfaces into the flow. An MHD equilibrium is reached when the flow relaxes and force balance is achieved. We ask what classes of MHD equilibria can be accessed from a given initial state via smooth incompressible ideal motion. It is found that certain boundary displacements are formally not supported. This follows from yet another investigation of the Hahm--Kulsrud--Taylor (HKT) problem, which highlights the resonant behaviour near a rational layer formed by a set of degenerate critical points in the flux-function…
Axisymmetric equilibria with incompressible flows of arbitrary direction are studied in the framework of magnetohydrodynamics under a variety of physically relevant side conditions. To this end a set of pertinent non-linear ODEs are transformed to quasilinear ones and the respective initial value problem is solved numerically with appropriately determined initial values near the magnetic axis. Several equilibria are then constructed surface by surface. The non field aligned flow results in novel configurations with a single magnetic axis, toroidal shell configurations in which the plasma is co…
Sawtooth crash in tokamak as a sequence of Multi-region Relaxed MHD equilibria
Nanyang Technological University（南洋理工大学）；Shanghai Jiao Tong University（上海交通大学）；Massachusetts Institute of Technology（麻省理工学院）；the Australian National University（澳大利亚国立大学）；École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne（洛桑联邦理工学院）；Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation（澳大利亚核科学与技术组织）
We present ECOM (Equilibrium solver via COnformal Mapping), a fast and accurate fixed boundary solver for toroidally axisymmetric magnetohydrodynamic equilibria with or without a toroidal flow. ECOM combines conformal mapping and Fourier and integral equation methods on the unit disk to achieve exponential convergence for the poloidal flux function as well as its first and second partial derivatives. As a consequence of its high order accuracy, for dense grids and tokamak-like elongations ECOM computes key quantities such as the safety factor and the magnetic shear with higher accuracy than th…
We describe the construction of stepped-pressure equilibria as extrema of a multi-region, relaxed magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) energy functional that combines elements of ideal MHD and Taylor relaxation, and which we call MRXMHD. The model is compatible with Hamiltonian chaos theory and allows the three-dimensional MHD equilibrium problem to be formulated in a well-posed manner suitable for computation. The energy-functional is discretized using a mixed finite-element, Fourier representation for the magnetic vector potential and the equilibrium geometry; and numerical solutions are constructed us…
Being motivated by the paper [O. I. Bogoyavlenskij, Phys. Rev. 66, 056410 (2002)] we generalise the symmetry transformations for MHD equilibria with isotropic pressure and incompressible flow parallel to the magnetic field introduced therein in the case of respective CGL equilibria with anisotropic pressure. We find that the geometrical symmetry of the field-aligned equilibria can break by those transformations only when the magnetic field is purely poloidal. In this situation we derive three-dimensional CGL equilibria from given axisymmetric ones. Also, we examine the generic symmetry transfo…
A simulated annealing (SA) relaxation method is used for calculation of high-beta reduced magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) equilibria in toroidal geometry. The SA method, based on artificial dynamics derived from the MHD Hamiltonian structure, is used to calculate equilibria of large-aspect-ratio and circular-cross-section tokamaks as well as toroidally averaged stellarators. Tokamak equilibria including incompressible poloidal rotations are obtained and the Shafranov shift is seen to increase nearly quadratically in the rotation speed. A mapping procedure between non-rotating and poloidally rotatin…
Analytic non-axisymmetric 3D MHD equilibria without stellarator symmetry
Google DeepMind（谷歌DeepMind）；Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, University of California San Diego（加州大学圣地亚哥分校机械与航空航天工程系）；University of Maryland, College Park（马里兰大学帕克学院）
In this paper, extending the investigation developed in an earlier paper (Cremaschini et al., 2008), we pose the problem of the kinetic description of gravitational Hall-MHD equilibria which may arise in accretion disks (AD) plasmas close to compact objects. When intense EM and gravitational fields, generated by the central object, are present, a convenient approach can be achieved in the context of the Vlasov-Maxwell description. In this paper the investigation is focused primarily on the following two aspects: 1) the formulation of the kinetic treatment of G-Hall-MHD equilibria. Based on the…
We study stationary free boundary configurations of an ideal incompressible magnetohydrodynamic fluid possessing nested flux surfaces. In 2D simply connected domains, we prove that if the magnetic field and velocity field are never commensurate, the only possible domain for any such equilibria is a disk, and the velocity and magnetic field are circular. We give examples of non-symmetric equilibria occupying a domain of any shape by imposing an external magnetic field generated by a singular current sheet charge distribution (external coils). Some results carry over to 3D axisymmetric solutions…
The structure of static MHD equilibria that admit continuous families of Euclidean symmetries is well understood. Such field configurations are governed by the classical Grad-Shafranov equation, which is a single elliptic PDE in two space dimensions. By revealing a hidden symmetry, we show that in fact all smooth solutions of the equilibrium equations with non-vanishing pressure gradients away from the magnetic axis satisfy a generalization of the Grad-Shafranov equation. In contrast to solutions of the classical Grad-Shafranov equation, solutions of he generalized equation are not automatical…
We show the stepped-pressure equilibria that are obtained from a generalization of Taylor relaxation known as multi-region, relaxed MHD (MRXMHD) are also generalizations of ideal MHD. We show this by proving that as the number of plasma regions becomes infinite, MRXMHD reduces to ideal MHD. Numerical convergence studies demonstrating this limit are presented.
3D free boundary equilibrium computations have recently been used to model external kinks and edge harmonic oscillations (EHOs), comparing with linear MHD stability codes, and nonlinear analytic theory [Kleiner et al, PPCF 61 084005 (2019)]. In this study, results of the VMEC equilibrium code are compared further with nonlinear reduced MHD simulations, using the JOREK code. The purpose of this investigation is to understand the extent to which the modelling approaches agree, and identify the important physical effects which can modify the dynamics. For the simulated external kink, which is dom…
The shape gradient quantifies the change in some figure of merit resulting from differential perturbations to a shape. Shape gradients can be applied to gradient-based optimization, sensitivity analysis, and tolerance calculation. An efficient method for computing the shape gradient for toroidal 3D MHD equilibria is presented. The method is based on the self-adjoint property of the equations for driven perturbations of MHD equilibria and is similar to the Onsager symmetry of transport coefficients. Two versions of the shape gradient are considered. One describes the change in a figure of merit…
The shape gradient is a local sensitivity function that provides the change in a figure of merit associated with a perturbation to the shape of the object. The shape gradient can be used for gradient-based optimization, sensitivity analysis, and tolerance calculations. However, it is generally expensive to compute from finite-difference derivatives for shapes which are described by many parameters, as is the case for stellarator geometry. In an accompanying work (Antonsen et al. 2019), generalized self-adjointness relations are obtained for MHD equilibria. These describe the relation between p…
It is proved that irrespective of compressibility tokamak steady states with purely poloidal mass flow can not exist in the framework of either magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) or Hall MHD models. Non-existence persists within single fluid plasma models with pressure anisotropy and incompressible flows.
The tangential layers are characterized by a bulk plasma velocity and a magnetic field that are perpendicular to the gradient direction. They have been extensively described in the frame of the Magneto-Hydro-Dynamic (MHD) theory. But the MHD theory does not look inside the transition region if the transition has a size of a few ion gyroradii. A series of kinetic tangential equilibria, valid for a collisionless plasma is presented. These equilibria are exact analytical solutions of the Maxwell-Vlasov equations. The particle distribution functions are sums of an infinite number of elementary fun…
Four different approximate approaches used to model the stressing of coronal magnetic fields due to an imposed photospheric motion are compared with each other and the results from a full time-dependent magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) code. The assumptions used for each of the approximate methods are tested by considering large photospheric footpoint displacements. We consider a simple model problem, comparing the full nonlinear magnetohydrodynamic evolution, determined with the Lare2D numerical code, with four approximate approaches. Two of these, magneto-frictional relaxation and a quasi-1D Grad-S…
A novel asymptotic matching procedure is developed to revisit the problem of magnetic island saturation in case of a finite current gradient at the rational surface. Nonlinear dispersion relation is derived for saturated magnetic island. It is shown that arbitrary normalization factors that were present in previous theories are fully specified with the asymptotic matching.
Many magnetic structures in the solar atmosphere evolve rather slowly so that they can be assumed as (quasi-)static or (quasi-)stationary and represented via magneto-hydrostatic (MHS) or stationary magneto-hydrodynamic (MHD) equilibria, respectively. While exact 3D solutions would be desired, they are extremely difficult to find in stationary MHD. We construct solutions with magnetic and flow vector fields that have three components depending on all three coordinates. We show that the non-canonical transformation method produces quasi-3D solutions of stationary MHD by mapping 2D or 2.5D MHS eq…
We present a discussion of two-dimensional magneto-hydrodynamics (MHD) configurations, concerning the equilibria of accretion disks of a strongly magnetized astrophysical object. We set up a viscoresistive scenario which generalizes previous two-dimensional analyses by reconciling the ideal MHD coupling of the vertical and the radial equilibria within the disk with the standard mechanism of the angular momentum transport, relying on dissipative properties of the plasma configuration. The linear features of the considered model are analytically developed and the non-linear configuration problem…
The aim of this study is to analyze the feedback process between the magnetic turbulence and the pressure gradients in LHD inward-shifted configurations as well as its role in the transition between the soft-hard MHD regimes for instabilities driven by the mode $1/2$ in the middle plasma. In the present paper we summarize the results of two simulations with different Lundquist numbers, $S = 2.5 \times 10^5$ and $10^6$, assuming a plasma in the slow reconnection regime. The results for the high Lundquist number simulation shows that the magnetic turbulence and the pressure gradient in the middl…
In the second magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) ballooning stable domain of a high-beta tokamak plasma, the Schroedinger equation for ideal MHD shear Alfven waves has discrete solutions corresponding to standing waves trapped between pressure-gradient-induced potential wells. Our goal is to understand how these so-called alpha-induced toroidal Alfven eigenmodes alpha-TAE are modified by the effects of finite Larmor radii (FLR) and kinetic compression of thermal ions in the limit of massless electrons. In the present paper, we neglect kinetic compression in order to isolate and examine in detail the ef…
A stellar wind passing through the reverse shock is deflected into the astrospheric tail and leaves the stellar system either as a sub-Alfvenic or as a super-Alfvenic tail flow. An example is our own heliosphere and its heliotail. We present an analytical method of calculating stationary, incompressible, and field-aligned plasma flows in the astrotail of a star. We present a recipe for constructing an astrosphere with the help of only a few parameters, like the inner Alfven Mach number and the outer Alfven Mach number, the magnetic field strength within and outside the stellar wind cavity, and…
Resistive steady states in toroidal magnetohydrodynamics (MHD), where Ohm's law must be taken into account, differ considerably from ideal ones. Only for special (and probably unphysical) resistivity profiles can the Lorentz force, in the static force-balance equation, be expressed as the gradient of a scalar and thus cancel the gradient of a scalar pressure. In general, the Lorentz force has a curl directed so as to generate toroidal vorticity. Here, we calculate, for a collisional, highly viscous magnetofluid, the flows that are required for an axisymmetric toroidal steady state, assuming un…
The pedestal profile measurements in high triangularity JET plasmas show that with low fuelling the pedestal width decreases during the ELM cycle and with high fuelling it stays constant. In the low fuelling case the pedestal pressure gradient keeps increasing until the ELM crash and in the high fuelling case it initially increases then saturates during the ELM cycle. Stability analysis reveals that both JET plasmas become unstable to finite-n ideal MHD peeling-ballooning modes at the end of the ELM cycle. During the ELM cycle, infinite-n ideal MHD ballooning modes and kinetic ballooning modes…
Narrow Operator Models of Stellarator Equilibria in Fourier Zernike Basis
1 Max-Planck-Institute for Plasma Physics, 17491 Greifswald, Germany 2 Institute for Research in Electronics \& Applied Physics, University of Maryland, MD 20742, USA 3 Mechanical；Aerospace Engineering, Princeton University, NJ 08544, USA
In three-dimensional ideal magnetohydrodynamics, closed flux surfaces cannot maintain both rational rotational-transform and pressure gradients, as these features together produce unphysical, infinite currents. A proposed set of equilibria nullifies these currents by flattening the pressure on sufficiently wide intervals around each rational surface. Such rational surfaces exist at every scale, which characterizes the pressure profile as self-similar and thus fractal. The pressure profile is approximated numerically by considering a finite number of rational regions and analyzed mathematically…
Stability properties and mode signature for equilibria of a model of electron temperature gradient (ETG) driven turbulence are investigated by Hamiltonian techniques. After deriving the infinite families of Casimir invariants, associated with the noncanonical Poisson bracket of the model, a sufficient condition for stability is obtained by means of the Energy-Casimir method. Mode signature is then investigated for linear motions about homogeneous equilibria. Depending on the sign of the equilibrium "translated" pressure gradient, stable equilibria can either be energy stable, i.e.\ possess def…
Stochastic single-stage stellarator optimization using fixed-boundary equilibria
Max-Planck-Institut für Plasmaphysik（马克斯·普朗克等离子体物理研究所）；Max-Planck Institute for Plasma Physics（马克斯·普朗克等离子体物理研究所）；Plasma Science and Fusion Center, Massachusetts Institute of Technology（麻省理工学院等离子体科学与聚变中心）；Department of Physics, University of Wisconsin-Madison（威斯康星大学麦迪逊分校物理系）；Instituto de Plasmas e Fusão Nuclear, Instituto Superior Técnico, Universidade de Lisboa（里斯本大学高等技术学院等离子体与核聚变研究所）
We study the possibility of constructing steady magnetic fields satisfying the force balance equation of ideal magnetohydrodynamics with tangential boundary conditions in asymmetric confinement vessels, i.e. bounded regions that are not invariant under continuous Euclidean isometries (translations, rotations, or their combination). This problem is often encountered in the design of next-generation fusion reactors. We show that such configurations are possible if one relaxes the standard assumption that the vessel boundary corresponds to a pressure isosurface. We exhibit a smooth solution that …
Grad-Shafranov equilibria via data-free physics informed neural networks
Institute for Research in Electronics and Applied Physics, University of Maryland（马里兰大学电子与应用物理研究所）；Courant Institute, New York University（纽约大学柯朗数学科学研究所）；Princeton University（普林斯顿大学）；Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute（伦斯勒理工学院）
SPECTRE: A robust solver for 3D equilibria with arbitrary topology
École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne（洛桑联邦理工学院）；Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne（洛桑联邦理工学院）；Proxima Fusion GmbH（Proxima Fusion有限公司）；Max-Planck-Institut für Plasmaphysik（马克斯·普朗克等离子体物理研究所）；York Plasma Institute, School of Physics, University of York（约克大学物理学院约克等离子体研究所）
Strong gradients in plasma flows play a major role in space and astrophysical plasmas. A typical situation is that a static plasma equilibrium is surrounded by a plasma flow, which can lead to strong plasma flow gradients at the separatrices between field lines with different magnetic topologies, e.g., planetary magnetospheres, helmet streamers in the solar corona, or at the boundary between the heliosphere and interstellar medium. Within this work we make a first step to understand the influence of these flows towards the occurrence of current sheets in a stationary state situation. We concen…
