Instability in a magnetised collisional plasma driven by a heat flow or a current

Abstract

We solve the linearised Vlasov-Fokker-Planck (VFP) equation to show that heat flow or an electrical current in a magnetized collisional plasma is unstable to the growth of a circularly polarised transverse perturbation to a zeroth order uniform magnetic field. The Braginskii (1965) transport equations exhibit the same instability in the appropriate limit. This is relevant to laser-produced plasmas, inertial fusion energy (IFE) and to dense cold interstellar plasmas.

arXiv commentAccepted for publication in Plasma Physics and Controlled Fusion

References in corpus (5)

• On the magnetic fields and particle acceleration in Cas A
• Magnetic Field Amplification in Tycho and other Shell-type Supernova Remnants
• Laser-driven strong magnetostatic fields with applications to charged beam transport and magnetized high energy-density physics
• Particle acceleration by shocks in supernova remnants
• Amplification of perpendicular and parallel magnetic fields by cosmic ray currents

Cited by in corpus (5)

• Cosmic-ray current-driven instabilities -- revisiting environmental conditions
• Collisional whistler instability and electron temperature staircase in inhomogeneous plasma
• Thermomagnetic instability of plasma composition gradients
• Updated Magnetized Transport Coefficients: Impact on Laser-Plasmas with Self-Generated or Applied Magnetic Fields
• Exploring extreme magnetization phenomena in directly-driven imploding cylindrical targets