Absorption of microwave energy at electron-cyclotron frequency is a promising method of heating plasma to thermonuclear temperatures in large toroidal devices in which the energy confinement time exceeds the characteristic time of energy exchange between the electron and ion components of the plasma. The smallness of the wavelength compared with the dimensions of the system makes it possible to use quasioptical waveguides which are easy to match with the plasma. The microwave power, injected in the form of an ordinary wave from the outer part of the torus in the direction of increase of the toroidal component of the magnetic field, is efficiently absorbed if the dimensions of the tokamak are greater than or of the order of those of the T-10 device and the initial temperature of the plasma is greater than 1 keV. In the quasi-continuous heating regime and with reasonable microwave beam cross-sections non-linear effects have no appreciable effect on the cyclotron heating efficiency.
Generation and heating of toroidally confined overdense plasmas with 2.45 GHz microwaves