Cyclotron maser radiation from inhomogeneous plasmas

Journal Article · Tue Feb 15 04:00:00 EST 2011 · Physics of Plasmas

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1063/1.3551697· OSTI ID:21535176

Cairns, R A; Vorgul, I ^[1]; Bingham, R ^[2]; Ronald, K; Speirs, D C; McConville, S L; Gillespie, K M; Bryson, R; Phelps, A D. R.; Cross, A W; Roberston, C W; Whyte, C G; He, W ^[3]; Kellett, B J ^[2]

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1. School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of St. Andrews, St. Andrews, Fife KY16 9SS (United Kingdom)
2. STFC Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Chilton, Didcot, Oxon OX11 0QX (United Kingdom)
3. Department of Physics, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow G4 0NG (United Kingdom)

Cyclotron maser instabilities are important in space, astrophysical, and laboratory plasmas. While extensive work has been done on these instabilities, most of it deals with homogeneous plasmas with uniform magnetic fields while in practice, of course, the systems are generally inhomogeneous. Here we expand on our previous work [R. A. Cairns, I. Vorgul, and R. Bingham, Phys. Rev. Lett. 101, 215003 (2008)] in which we showed that localized regions of instability can exist in an inhomogeneous plasma and that the way in which waves propagate away from this region is not necessarily obvious from the homogeneous plasma dispersion relation. While we consider only a simple ring distribution in velocity space, because of its tractability, the ideas may point toward understanding the behavior in the presence of more realistic distributions. The main object of the present work is to move away from consideration of the local dispersion relation and show how global growing eigenmodes can be constructed.

• OSTI ID: 21535176
• Journal Information: Physics of Plasmas, Journal Name: Physics of Plasmas Journal Issue: 2 Vol. 18; ISSN PHPAEN; ISSN 1070-664X
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY
AMPLIFIERS
DISPERSION RELATIONS
ELECTRONIC EQUIPMENT
EQUIPMENT
INHOMOGENEOUS PLASMA
INSTABILITY
MASERS
MICROWAVE AMPLIFIERS
MICROWAVE EQUIPMENT
PLASMA
PLASMA INSTABILITY