Alfvénic high-frequency oscillations at the pedestal of JET plasmas

Abstract

Long-lived ($\sim 10$ s) high-frequency oscillations (HFOs, $50-450$ kHz) near the plasma edge have been reported and experimentally described in L-H transition studies at JET and AUG. In this work, we show that these HFOs are a general phenomenon observed in various plasma scenarios and compositions (H$^1$, D, D-He$^3$, D-T) under different heating schemes, including pure Ohmic, ICRH and NBI. We demonstrate that dominant axisymmetric ($n=0$) HFOs are Global Alfvén eigenmodes (GAEs) tied to the shear-Alfvén continuum (SAC) minima arising at the plasma edge due to the sharp decrease of the density and increase of the safety factor. This hypothesis is corroborated by the remarkable agreement found between the measured frequencies of HFOs and the SAC minima computed by the ideal MHD code CSMISH for a comprehensive set of JET pulses. This result, along with the fact that HFOs are observed over long time windows and across a variety of plasma scenarios, makes them convenient MHD constraints for accurate equilibrium reconstruction near the edge. In view of this pragmatic application, we derive a first-order analytic expression for the two lowest coupled branches of the $n=0$ SAC, disclosing their dependence (and, consequently, that of the HFOs) on the plasma density, safety factor, and elongation profiles. In addition, we discuss the nature of $n\neq 0$ HFOs observed along with the dominant $n=0$ HFOs.