Fundamental investigation of reflectometry as a density fluctuation diagnostic (invited)

Reflectometry is currently used to monitor density fluctuations and turbulent correlation lengths in fusion plasmas. Various models have been used to interpret the experimental data and to determine the regimes of validity of the reflectometer fluctuation measurements. Heretofore, these models have not been validated by direct comparison with experiment. In this paper the first comparison between a controlled laboratory experiment and a one‐dimensional numerical model is presented. It is found that the model is unable to predict the observed high degree of spatial localization and dependence on perturbation wave number. The implications of these disagreements are discussed, together with suggestions for their resolution.