Neoclassical poloidal plasma rotation in tokamaks during radio frequency heating

A neoclassical theory of poloidal rotation in tokamaks is developed for rf-heated plasmas. It is based on a moment expansion but, in contrast to the usual neoclassical theory, which takes into account the strong deformation of the local equilibrium distribution function due to rf heating. This distribution function is the solution, in the banana regime, of the drift kinetic equation, which includes both collisional diffusion and quasilinear rf diffusion operators. The set of closed, self-consistent transport and rotation equations is obtained in a form similar to its usual neoclassical counterpart. The parallel components of the generalized stress tensors are calculated. This allows us to solve the transport equations for the poloidal rotation that is obtained in explicit form. Modifications of the poloidal rotation due to the rf heating are also discussed. (C) 2001 American Institute of Physics.