Stationary Bernstein-Greene-Kruskal structures in a current carrying relativistic cold plasma

Abstract

Nonlinear stationary structures formed in a cold plasma with immobile ions in the presence of a relativistic electron current beam have been investigated analytically in the collisionless limit. These are cold plasma version of the relativistic Berstein-Greene-Kruskal (BGK) waves. The structure profile is governed by the ratio of maximum electrostatic field energy density to the relativistic kinetic energy density of the electron beam, {\it i.e.}, ${\kappa }_R=E_m/(8\pi n_0({\gamma }_0-1)m_0{c}^2{)}^{1/2}$, where $E_m$ is the maximum electric field associated with the nonlinear structure and ${\gamma }_0$ is the Lorentz factor associated with the beam velocity. It is found that, in the linear limit, {\it i.e.}, ${\kappa }_R\ll 1/\sqrt{{\gamma }_0}$, the fluid variables, {\it viz}, density, electric field, and velocity vary harmonically in space. In the range $0<{\kappa }_R\le 1/\sqrt{{\gamma }_0}$, the fluid variables exhibit an-harmonic behavior. For values of ${\kappa }_R>1/\sqrt{{\gamma }_0}$, the electric field shows finite discontinuities at specific spatial locations indicating the formation of negatively charged planes at these locations.

24 pages, 39 figures