Stellarator expansion methods for MHD equilibrium and stability calculations (Q1088539)

Two methods for performing stellarator expansion, or average method, MHD calculations are described. The first method includes the calculation of vacuum, equilibrium, and stability using the Greene and Johnson stellarator expansion in which the equilibrium is reduced to a two- dimensional problem by averaging over the geometric toroidal angle in real space coordinates. In the second method, the average is performed in a system of vacuum magnetic coordinates. Both methods are implemented to utilize realistic vacuum field information, making them applicable to configuration studies and machine design as well as to basic research. Illustrative examples are presented to detail the sensitivities of the calculations to physical parameters, to show numerical convergence, and to show the comparison of these methods with each other and with other methods.