Subharmonic electromagnetic radiation from cavitons

In a high-power microwave-plasma system, it has been experimentally found that electromagnetic (em) radiation at subharmonic frequencies specifically, (3/2)₀ and (5/2)₀] of the electron plasma frequency of the unperturbed state, ₀, can be emanated from cavitons which are resonantly driven by an intense em pulse (frequency ₀) in an unmagnetized inhomogeneous plasma. Electron oscillations at ~ (1/2)₀ are preferentially excited inside a deep (|n/n_c|0.5) caviton although this is not deep enough to resonantly support (1/2)₀ oscillations. The experimental results show that the coupling between the (1/2)₀ electron oscillations inside the caviton and the electron plasma waves at (3/2)₀, which is originally excited due to the mode conversion of the incident microwave at the resonant layer and which generates the caviton, produces a localized nonlinear current which emits em waves at (3/2)₀. A similar coupling between (3/2)₀ and ₀ frequencies can emit em waves at (5/2)₀. The model to explain the above new phenomenon is discussed.Institute of Research and Development, and School of High Technology for Human Welfare, Tokai University, Japan. Department of Physics, University of California, Los Angeles, California. Published in Izvestiya Vysshikh Uchebnykh Zavedenii, Radiofizika, Vol. 37, No. 5, pp. 596–616, May, 1994.