Fast Advection of Magnetic Fields by Hot Electrons

Journal Article · Fri Aug 27 00:00:00 EDT 2010 · Physical Review Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PHYSREVLETT.105.095001· OSTI ID:21470995

Willingale, L; Thomas, A G. R.; Krushelnick, K ^[1]; Nilson, P M; Kaluza, M C; Dangor, A E; Evans, R G; Fernandes, P; Haines, M G; Kamperidis, C; Kingham, R J; Ridgers, C P; Sherlock, M; Wei, M S; Najmudin, Z ^[1]; Bandyopadhyay, S; Notley, M ^[2]; Minardi, S; Tatarakis, M ^[3]; Rozmus, W ^[4]

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1. Blackett Laboratory, Imperial College London, London, SW7 2BZ (United Kingdom)
2. Central Laser Facility, Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Chilton, Oxon, OX11 0QX (United Kingdom)
3. Centre for Plasma Physics and Lasers, Department of Electronics, Technological Educational Institute of Crete, Chania, Crete (Greece)
4. Department of Physics, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta (Canada)

Experiments where a laser-generated proton beam is used to probe the megagauss strength self-generated magnetic fields from a nanosecond laser interaction with an aluminum target are presented. At intensities of 10{sup 15} W cm{sup -2} and under conditions of significant fast electron production and strong heat fluxes, the electron mean-free-path is long compared with the temperature gradient scale length and hence nonlocal transport is important for the dynamics of the magnetic field in the plasma. The hot electron flux transports self-generated magnetic fields away from the focal region through the Nernst effect [A. Nishiguchi et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 53, 262 (1984)] at significantly higher velocities than the fluid velocity. Two-dimensional implicit Vlasov-Fokker-Planck modeling shows that the Nernst effect allows advection and self-generation transports magnetic fields at significantly faster than the ion fluid velocity, v{sub N}/c{sub s{approx_equal}}10.

• OSTI ID: 21470995
• Journal Information: Physical Review Letters, Vol. 105, Issue 9; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.105.095001; (c) 2010 American Institute of Physics; ISSN 0031-9007
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY
ADVECTION
ALUMINIUM
COMPUTERIZED SIMULATION
ELECTRONS
FOKKER-PLANCK EQUATION
HEAT FLUX
IONS
LASER-PRODUCED PLASMA
MAGNETIC FIELDS
MEAN FREE PATH
NERNST EFFECT
PLASMA SIMULATION
PROTON BEAMS
TEMPERATURE GRADIENTS
BEAMS
CHARGED PARTICLES
DIFFERENTIAL EQUATIONS
ELEMENTARY PARTICLES
ELEMENTS
EQUATIONS
FERMIONS
LEPTONS
MASS TRANSFER
METALS
NUCLEON BEAMS
PARTIAL DIFFERENTIAL EQUATIONS
PARTICLE BEAMS
PLASMA
SIMULATION