Lower hybrid wave heating into neutral beam heated plasma in the JT-60 tokamak

Injection of high-power lower hybrid waves (LHW) of up to 6.0 MW into neutral-beam-20 MW-heated plasmas with the medium electron density regime (n-bare ≤ 3.5 x 1019 m-3) increases the plasma energy content at the same incremental energy confinement time as in the case of neutral beam heating alone. In addition to thermal electron and ion heating, LHW accelerates beam ions to energies considerably higher than the beam injection energy. In contrast to LH injection into OH plasmas in the same density regime, where substantial high-energy electron production is observed, the case of combined heating shows much less high-energy electrons. The heating efficiency of LHW in the combined heating case tends to decrease as the electron density is increased. Ray-tracing analysis suggests that the accessibility condition prevents effective heating in a high-density plasma. Estimation of wave damping, which is taking account of the beam component of the ion velocity distribution function, indicates that waves are absorbed by beam ions before they are absorbed by electrons. (author)