Impact of hydrogen isotope species on microinstabilities in helical plasmas

The impact of isotope ion mass on ion-scale and electron-scale microinstabilities such as ion temperature gradient (ITG) mode, trapped electron mode (TEM), and electron temperature gradient (ETG) mode in helical plasmas are investigated by using gyrokinetic Vlasov simulations with a hydrogen isotope and real-mass kinetic electrons. Comprehensive scans for the equilibrium parameters and magnetic configurations clarify the transition from ITG mode to TEM instability, where a significant TEM enhancement is revealed in the case of inward-shifted plasma compared to that in the standard configuration. It is elucidated that the ion-mass dependence on the ratio of the electron–ion collision frequency to the ion transit one, i.e. νₑᵢ/ωₜᵢ∝ (mᵢ/mₑ)1/2 , leads to a stabilization of the TEM for heavier isotope ions. The ITG growth rate indicates a gyro-Bohm-like ion-mass dependence, where the mixing-length estimate of diffusivity yields γ /k_²∝ mᵢ1/2 . On the other hand, a weak isotope dependence of the ETG growth rate is identified. A collisionality scan also reveals that the TEM stabilization by the isotope ions becomes more significant for relatively higher collisionality in a banana regime.