Linear stability of the tearing mode with two-fluid and curvature effects in tokamaks

Curvature and diamagnetic effects are both recognized to have a stabilizing influence on tearing modes in the linear regime. In this paper, we investigate the impact of these effects on the linear stability of a (2, 1) magnetic island using non-linear two-fluid MHD simulations and we apply our results to Tore Supra experiments where its stability is not well understood from the single fluid MHD model. Simulations show an initial increase of the linear growth rate and then its reduction until full stability as diamagnetic frequency increases. This mechanism is therefore a plausible explanation for experimental observations where the (2, 1) mode was not observed although the single fluid model predicted its growth. Our simulations also show the importance of curvature for an efficient stabilization. A simple analytical model is derived to support the numerical results.