Kinetic Ballooning Mode Turbulence Simulation based on Electromagnetic Gyrokinetics

Abstract

The kinetic ballooning mode (KBM) turbulence in Tokamak plasma is investigated by electromagnetic gyrokinetic simulations. From the entropy balance analysis, it is revealed that the field-particle interactions transfer a significant fraction of the ion entropy produced by the instability to electrons. Then, the produced ion entropy balances to the sum of the ion and electron dissipations at the saturation of the KBM instability growth, in contrast to ITG turbulence where ion entropy production mostly balances to ion dissipation.