Evolution of Heavy Ion Beam Probing from the Origins to Study of Symmetric Structures in Fusion Plasmas

The overview discusses development of the unique fusion plasma diagnostics—Heavy Ion Beam Probing (HIBP) in application to toroidal magnetic plasma devices. The basis of the HIBP measurements of the plasma electric potential and processing of experimental data are considered. Diagnostic systems for probing plasma in tokamaks TM-4, TJ-1, TUMAN-3M and T-10, stellarators WEGA, TJ-II and Uragan-2M are presented. Promising results of the HIBP projects for various existing modern machines, such as TCV, TCABR, MAST, COMPASS, GLOBUS-M2, T-15 MD and W7-X and the international fusion tokamak reactor ITER are given. Results from two machines with similar size and plasma parameters, but with different types of the magnetic con-figuration: axisymmetric tokamak T-10 and helically symmetric stellarator TJ-II are compared. The results of studies of stationary potential profiles and oscillations in the form of quasimonochromatic and broadband fluctuations, turbulent particle flux, fluctuations of density and poloidal magnetic field are presented. The properties of symmetric structures—zonal flows and geodesic acoustic modes of plasma oscillations as well as Alfvén Eigenmodes excited by fast particles from neutral beam injection heating are described. General trends in the behavior of electric potential and turbulence in magnetized fusion plasmas are revealed.