Viscosity and thermal conductivity effects on the containment of a toroidally confined resistive plasma with flow

Plasma containment in toroidal systems is studied using a fluid model containing the effects of plasma inertia, resistivity (electron-ion momentum transfer), viscosity (ion-ion collisions), and thermal conductivity. Asymptotic expansion techniques are used to separate the problem into two distinct parts-determination of steady state configurations where time variations occur only on a diffusion time scale, and investigation of the stability of these equilibria. The previously known steady-state solutions are shown to be stable. However, terms in the stress tensor associated with the curvature of the magnetic field lines, which introduce parallel viscosity into the components of the momentum equation perpendicular to the field, are shown to restrict the possible solutions.