Turbulence Phase Space in Simple Magnetized Toroidal Plasmas

Plasma turbulence in a simple magnetized torus (SMT) is explored for the first time with three-dimensional global fluid simulations. Three turbulence regimes are described: an ideal interchange mode regime, a previously undiscovered resistive interchange mode regime, and a drift-wave regime. As the pitch of the field lines is decreased, the simulations exhibit a transition from the first regime to the second, while the third—the drift-wave regime—is likely accessible to the experiments only at very low collisionalities.