Characterization of Nondiffusive Transport in Plasma Turbulence via a Novel Lagrangian Method Articles uri icon

publication date

  • October 2008

start page

  • 165001

issue

  • 16

volume

  • 101

International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)

  • 0031-9007

Electronic International Standard Serial Number (EISSN)

  • 1079-7114

abstract

  • A novel method to probe and characterize the nature of the transport of passive scalars carried out by a turbulent flow is introduced. It requires the determination of two exponents which encapsulate the
    statistical and correlation properties of the component of interest of
    the Lagrangian velocities of the flow. Numerical simulations of a
    magnetically confined, near-critical turbulent plasma, known to exhibit
    superdiffusive radial transport, are used to illustrate the method. It
    is shown that the method can easily detect the change in the dynamics of
    the radial transport that takes place after adding to the simulations a
    (subdominant) diffusive channel of tunable strength.