Antenna-plasma coupling theory for ICRF heating of large tokamaks

The coupling characteristics of antenna structure are studied by analyzing a model where a thin current sheet is placed between a fully conducting wall and a sheet of anisotropic conductivity representing the screen. The inhomogeneous plasma in the shadow of the limiter is assumed to extend from the screen onwards away from the antenna. The excitation of the fields inside the plasma are found by analyzing the radiation properties of this current sheet antenna. We assume that the current distribution of the antenna is given and that the fields excited inside the plasma are absorbed in a single pass. In all experiments to-date the cross-sectional plasmas are relatively small so that the rf conductor is a half-loop around the plasma in the poloidal direction. However, for reactor size plasmas this cannot be done and the antenna dimensions will be small compared to the plasma cross-sections. We, thus, assume an antenna of finite poloidal and toroidal extent with dimensions small compared to the plasma minor radius. We further approximate the coupling geometry by a slab model. The x-axis is taken to be along the plasma inhomogeneity, the y-axis along the poloidal direction and the x-axis along the toroidal magnetic field