Shock formation in electron-ion plasmas: mechanism and timing

Abstract

We analyse the full shock formation process in electron-ion plasmas in theory and simulations. It is accepted that electromagnetic shocks in initially unmagnetised relativistic plasmas are triggered by the filamentation instability. However, the transition from the first unstable phase to the quasi-steady shock is still missing. We derive a theoretical model for the shock formation time, taking into account the filament merging in the non-linear phase of the filamentation instability. This process is much slower than in electron-positron pair shocks, so that the shock formation is longer by a factor proportional to sqrt(m_i/m_e) ln(m_i/m_e).

References in corpus (3)

• On the structure of relativistic collisionless shocks in electron-ion plasmas
• Long Term Evolution of Magnetic Turbulence in Relativistic Collisionless Shocks: Electron-Positron Plasmas
• Collisionless Weibel shocks: full formation mechanism and timing

Cited by in corpus (5)

• PIC Simulation Methods for Cosmic Radiation and Plasma Instabilities
• Microphysics of Relativistic Collisionless Electron-ion-positron Shocks
• Density jump as a function of magnetic field for collisionless shocks in pair plasmas: the perpendicular case
• Hierarchy of instabilities for two counter-streaming magnetized pair beams: influence of field obliquity
• Density jump as a function of magnetic field strength for perpendicular collisionless shocks with anisotropic upstream pressure