Description
The plasma current drive has been an essential for the recent achievement of high performance KSTAR discharges. For the effective plasma current drive, near-parallel P-NB and EC has been routine auxiliaries in KSTAR. In addition to these conventional technologies, helicon current drive [1] has been developed to supply efficient off-axis current to the KSTAR plasmas for the development of steady-state high beta plasmas as a DEMO relevant technology. The evidence of the helicon power coupling to the plasma was observed following the increase of injection power through MW level travelling wave antenna. In this presentation, the status and the near-term plan of KSTAR current drive and modelling study of helicon current drive in K-DEMO will be discussed.
References
[1]. S. J. Wang et al, Nucl. Fusion, 57, (2017) 046010
