Role of explosive instabilities in high-beta disruptions in tokamaks

Abstract

Intrinsically explosive growth of a ballooning finger is demonstrated in nonlinear magnetohydrodynamic calculations of high-beta disruptions in tokamak. The explosive linger is formed by an ideally unstable n = 1 mode, dominated by an min = 2/1 component. The quadrupole geometry of the 2/1 perturbed pressure field provides a generic mechanism for the formation of the initial ballooning finger and its subsequent transition from exponential to explosive growth, without relying on secondary processes. The explosive ejection of the hot plasma from the core and stochastization of the magnetic field occur on Alfvenic time scales, accounting for the extremely fast growth of the precursor oscillations and the rapidity of the thermal quench in some high-) disruptions.