The polarization current associated with a neoclassical tearing mode (NTM) is studied by means of drift kinetic δf simulations. This current has been invoked as a possible explanation for both the observed threshold for the minimum island size that can grow unstable and the scaling of the plasma pressure at the mode onset with the normalized gyroradius, even though the theory is not able to predict the island rotation direction and hence the role (whether stabilizing or destabilizing) of the polarization current for the island evolution. In the numerical approach presented in this paper, the island rotation frequency can be assigned as an input parameter and the corresponding behaviour of the current can be studied. The calculations are performed in toroidal geometry in the presence of a helical perturbation. It is found that kinetic effects lead to a sign reversal of the polarization current for rotation frequencies close to the diamagnetic frequency even for flat pressure profiles, thus influencing both the sign and size of the polarization-current contribution to the NTM evolution.
Tearing mode stability in a sheared slab model of the tokamak plasma