Resonant Faraday shield ICRH antenna

ICRH has proved to be an efficient method of heating the plasma in toroidal devices. The high voltages needed at the coupling structure are, however, a severe handicap of this method. The possibility is investigated of having the highest voltages between the bars of the Faraday shield (FS), where they are both necessary and easier to maintain. For this purpose a resonant Faraday shield (RFS) antenna where the first and last bars of the FS are connected by an inductive strip is proposed. In front of this strip there is a second strip, fed, as in a conventional antenna, by an RF generator. It is shown that if the toroidal length of the FS is larger lambda/2 the strip connecting the bars of the FS acts as the secondary coil of a tuned transformer, the strip fed by the generator being the primary. It is therefore possible, by varying the frequency and the distance between the two strips, i.e. the coupling coefficient, to match the impedance of the primary to that of the generator.