Coherent structures and transport properties in magnetized plasmas

A common feature of magnetized plasmas is the presence of fluctuations, which can lead to fully developed turbulence. Often large events - called bursts - emerge from the remaining low-level turbulence, giving an intermittent character to fluctuations; namely the statistical properties of fluctuations are found to depend on the temporal scale over which the investigation is conducted. In magnetized plasmas, the bursts are generally believed to be due to the presence of magnetic-field-aligned structures. Moreover, it has been experimentally shown that the intermittent events detected in the signals are associated with a relevant contribution to the loss of particles from the plasma. All these observations are common to plasmas spanning a wide range of temperature and density and magnetically confined both in linear and toroidal devices. In particular, in high-temperature plasmas for thermonuclear fusion, research aims at devising suitable ways to control transport by acting on the plasma structures, for instance by biasing the plasma edge using electrodes. This paper gives a characterization of the structures found in magnetized plasmas and of their contribution to the particle transport; moreover, the effect of the velocity shear on structures is addressed. Emphasis will be laid on to the most advanced diagnostics allowing the reconstruction of turbulent structures by optical and electrostatic techniques. © 2007 IOP Publishing Ltd.