The Frascati Tokamak Upgrade machine: availability analysis, main results and future programme

The paper presents a general overview of the Frascati Tokamak Upgrade (FTU) machine operation in the last two years. About 3500 pulses were performed (mostly in D₂) with a toroidal field between 2.5 and 8 Tesla and a plasma current between 0.35-1.3 MA, according to the experimental programmes. An availability analysis of the FTU plant was performed, which pointed out the number of pulses per day and the causes of delay. The main research activities concentrated on plasma MHD studies with different heating scenarios: lower hybrid waves current drive (LHCD) and electron cyclotron resonance heating (ECRH) were used both alone and together to investigate synergetic effects. Strong effort was devoted to high density (1×10²⁰ m^-3) current drive experiments and investigating the possibility of obtaining and sustaining shear reversal configurations. Near term scientific and technological programmes are also reported