Hydrocarbon transport in a plasma boundary layer

The theory of carbon transport in a plasma boundary layers is important for understanding the impurity penetration, and carbon and hydrogen recycling, in tokamaks using carbon compounds as limiters and as wall coatings. Neutral carbon kinetics and transport at the edge of plasma devices where chemical release is a source of carbon are modeled. Plasma reactions with carbon and hydrocarbons are important for such modeling, and these collisional processes are summarized. Combining the reaction schemes and kinetics in the DEGAS code makes it possible to treat the neutral transport at the plasma boundary layer. Results of such modeling of the atomic carbon and methane distribution at the edge are presented for comparison with recent carbon probe experiments performed on the Divertor and Injection Tokamak Experiment (DITE).