Global Particle-Simulation Studies of Plasma-Microturbulence Properties
Hal Finkel, Yale University
Simulations of the global plasma microturbulence properties in a magnetically-confined high-temperature plasma were carried out using an advanced version of a particle-in-cell code (GTC) that was developed at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) and implemented on the Intrepid IBM Blue Gene/P system – DOE’s Leadership Class Facility (LCF) at Argonne National Laboratory. In addition to developing useful diagnostic tools for analysis of large-scale kinetic simulations, specific applications of such capabilities were carried out to examine possible theoretically-proposed nonlinear turbulence features. In particular, analysis of some of the results obtained indicate that there is no significant evidence to support the hypothesized double-cascade feature, where energy cascades to large scales while enstrophy cascades to small scales.
Abstract Author(s): Hal Finkel