The kinetic equilibrium reconstruction in TCV with LIUQE/RAPTOR: first real-time demonstration during plasma operation

The Kinetic Equilibrium Reconstruction (KER), coupling self-consistently the free-boundary equilibrium code LIUQE to the 1.5D transport code RAPTOR, has been performed for the first time in real-time during TCV plasma operation. RAPTOR can solve predictively the flux surface averaged Ohm's law, the electron heat Te and the particle ne diffusion equations providing self-consistent p($\rho $,t) and j($\rho $,t) constraints to the free-boundary equilibrium code. An Extended Kalman Filter technique is used to combine the kinetic measurements available in real-time and transport code prediction yielding a robust state estimation of the plasma profiles. During different plasma states (flat central ne, ECCD induced j profile broadening, NTM induced Te drop) the KER is shown to reproduce better the profile modifications when compared to the standard equilibrium reconstruction, where only external magnetic measurements are considered.