Status of diagnostic development to measure parallel wavenumber of lower hybrid waves on Alcator C-Mod

Recent lower hybrid (LH) current drive experiments on Alcator C-Mod have motivated measurement of the parallel wavenumber of LH waves with an aim to understand the significance of the k∥ up-shift mechanisms such as scattering by turbulence or parametric decay instabilities. To this end, a new diagnostic system is under development, consisting of two rows of three RF magnetic loop probes (one row sensitive to B∥, the other row B) and three Langmuir probes. These will be mounted on a radially movable probe system on the low field side of the tokamak, which is magnetically mapped to the LH launcher but toroidally separated by about 110 deg from the launcher. This location is expected to be ideal for detecting the parallel wavenumber spectrum of the pump and sideband LH waves up to n∥ of 6.5. The use of the loop probes will help unambiguously resolve the polarization of these waves. These loop probes have been developed under the collaboration with the University of Tokyo, and vacuum-compatible versions have recently been fabricated and tested on the bench. To evaluate the phase of the detected waves, the signals at 4.6 GHz will be frequency down-converted to 25 MHz in an intermediate frequency stage, and directly digitized at a sampling rate of 100 MS/sec. This system will output the dominant parallel wavenumber for each frequency, selected by controlling the frequency of a local oscillator in the IF stage. In addition to these loop probes, the Langmuir probes will be used to provide the density and temperature information at the measurement location to perform instability analyses. The Langmuir probes will be also used to examine the sensitivity of the radial measurement location on the strength of the sideband LH waves. Details of this proposed diagnostic system and the latest status will be presented.