A novel, multichannel, comb-frequency Doppler backscatter system

Doppler backscattering has emerged in recent years as a powerful diagnostic tool in high temperature fusion plasmas. The technique is sensitive to plasma turbulence flow and has been utilized to determine radial electric field and to study geodesic acoustic modes, zonal flows, and intermediate scale density turbulence. The current manuscript describes a novel technique for creating a stable, multichannel system covering the V-band frequency range (50-75 GHz) which enables simultaneous monitoring of turbulent flows and fluctuation levels at eight distinct spatial locations. The system is based on a high-frequency, low phase noise comb-frequency generator combined with a filter bank and quadrature detection system. The system is now in operation on DIII-D and has allowed monitoring of the flow and turbulence levels across the plasma radius during events such as the L-H transition.