Plasma boundary determination in iter by the optimized current filament method

An accurate and simple technique for plasma boundary determination in a tok amak from external magnetic measurements is described. The method uses the filamentary current model of the plasma current profile, optimized to compl y with the requirement of 1 cm accuracy in the determination of the plasma boundary in ITER. An error analysis is performed by numerical simulation of the ITER plasma configuration. The conclusion is that the method can provi de this accuracy provided that the level of relative measurement errors can be kept below 1%.