Resistive wall mode stabilization by plasma rotation in advanced tokamaks

By combining previous results of Betti and Freidberg [Phys. Rev. Lett. 74, 2949 (1995)] and Eriksson [Phys. Plasmas 2, 3095 (1995)], a fully analytical description is obtained for the stabilizing effect of toroidal plasma rotation in a large aspect ratio tokamak surrounded by a resistive wall. As in advanced tokamak configurations with a large fraction of bootstrap current, it is assumed that the current gradient near the plasma edge is large. This assumption enables an analytical analysis of external kink modes with low poloidal mode numbers. An expression is obtained, showing explicitly how the window of stable wall distances depends on the current profile. (C) 1996 American Institute of Physics.