Quark–gluon plasma as a strongly coupled color-Coulombic plasma

We show that the extensively studied equation of state (EOS) of strongly coupled QED plasma fits the recent lattice EOS data of gluon plasma remarkably well, with appropriate modifications to take account of color degrees of freedom and the running coupling constant. Hence we conclude that the quark–gluon plasma near the critical temperature is a strongly coupled color-Coulombic plasma. Received: 13 January 1999 / Revised version: 22 March 1999 / Published online: 14 October 1999     

Simulation of laser–plasma interactions and fast-electron transport in inhomogeneous plasma

A new framework is introduced for kinetic simulation of laser–plasma interactions in an inhomogeneous plasma motivated by the goal of performing integrated kinetic simulations of fast-ignition laser fusion. The algorithm addresses the propagation and absorption of an intense electromagnetic wave in an ionized plasma leading to the generation and transport of an energetic electron component. The energetic electrons propagate farther into the plasma to much higher densities where Coulomb collisions become important. The high-density plasma supports an energetic electron current, return currents, self-consistent electric fields associated with maintaining quasi-neutrality, and self-consistent magnetic fields due to the currents. Collisions of the electrons and ions are calculated accurately to track the energetic electrons and model their interactions with the background plasma. Up to a density well above critical density, where the laser electromagnetic field is evanescent, Maxwell’s equations are solved with a conventional particle-based, finite-difference scheme. In the higher-density plasma, Maxwell’s equations are solved using an Ohm’s law neglecting the inertia of the background electrons with the option of omitting the displacement current in Ampere’s law. Particle equations of motion with binary collisions are solved for all electrons and ions throughout the system using weighted particles to resolve the density gradient efficiently. The algorithm is analyzed and demonstrated in simulation examples. The simulation scheme introduced here achieves significantly improved efficiencies.     

再论plasma的译名

对plasma一词的译名问题,我本人曾发表过看法[1],近来也有不少人关心这个问题,发表了自己的方案[2,3].自从1927年Langmuir用plasma一词来描述放电管中一个区域以来,今天已经80年了.在这80年里,plasma以及与之相关的词汇使用得愈来愈多,而其涵义被不断地拓展与更新.一个物理名词被引进后,其内涵随着科学的进展不断拓宽,以它为词根的术语和组合词愈来愈多,而且愈来愈长.这是科学术语发展和演化的总趋势,我们制订物理学名词时不能不考虑这一因素,这也是我们近年来制订物理学名词时得到的深刻经验教训.基于上述情况,我们制订中文物理学名词时,…     

Spectroscopy of He–Ne afterglow plasma

Implementation of promising control schemes for the intensity and position of X-ray-laser beams with a photon energy up to several tens of kiloelectronvolts requires knowledge of the angular dependence of cross sections for photoionization of noble gas atoms by hard photons. Estimates of quadrupole corrections to the cross section for photoionization of a Kr atom by X-ray photons with an energy of about 25 keV are reported in this paper. An analytic expression for the cross section of the process is parameterized in a compact form convenient for analyzing angular distributions with an arbitrary polarization of a photon beam.     

Mikhel’son effect in a plasma

An analysis is made of the parametric frequency shift of an electromagnetic wave traveling in a plasma (isotropic collisionless, isotropic collisional, and magnetized collisionless) with time-varying parameters (Mikhel’son effect). Different situations corresponding to the growth of plasma concentration, a change of collision frequency, and a change of magnetic field are considered.     

Physical aspects of dust–plasma interactions

Low-pressure gas discharge plasmas are known to be strongly affected by the presence of small dust particles. This issue plays a role in the investigations of dust particle-forming plasmas, where the dust-induced instabilities may affect the properties of synthesized dust particles. Also, gas discharges with large amounts of microparticles are used in microgravity experiments, where strongly coupled subsystems of charged microparticles represent particle-resolved models of liquids and solids. In this field, deep understanding of dust–plasma interactions is required to construct the discharge configurations which would be able to model the desired generic condensed matter physics as well as, in the interpretation of experiments, to distinguish the plasma phenomena from the generic condensed matter physics phenomena. In this review, we address only physical aspects of dust–plasma interactions, that is, we always imply constant chemical composition of the plasma as well as constant size of the dust particles. We also restrict the review to two discharge types: dc discharge and capacitively coupled rf discharge. We describe the experimental methods used in the investigations of dust–plasma interactions and show the approaches to numerical modelling of the gas discharge plasmas with large amounts of dust. Starting from the basic physical principles governing the dust–plasma interactions, we discuss the state-of-the-art understanding of such complicated, discharge-type-specific phenomena as dust-induced stratification and transverse instability in a dc discharge or void formation and heartbeat instability in an rf discharge.     

X-ray calculations for a NLTE Ar plasma

A model is developed to calculate emission spectrum of non-local thermodynamic equilibrium(NLTE) plasmas. The Collisional-Radiative model is adopted for non-LTE population calculations. Configuration-averaged rate coefficients that needed in the rate equations are obtained based on the first order perturbation theory. The Hatree-Fock-Slater self-consistent-field method is used to calculate electron wave functions. The present model is applied to the calculation of emissivity from a Ar plasma. The features of the spectra are in good agreement with those calculated by other theoretical models, but the data of the integrated emissivity differ by a factor 2～8.     

Modified Phillips–Tikhonov regularization for plasma tomography

The tomography has been used as a powerful diagnostic method for visualizing cross-sectional images in plasma research. Without any biasing data, the Phillips–Tikhonov (P–T) regularization method was attempted in this work to reconstruct cross-sectional phantom images of the plasma by minimizing the gradient between adjacent pixel data. A comparison of the tomographic reconstructions of the cross-sectional images similar to the tokamak plasmas by the P–T method and the maximum entropy (ME) method showed that the P–T method produced more accurate results. In addition, the P–T method was modified by adding an iteration procedure with a second-order correction to improve the accuracy of the reconstruction for noisy line-integrated data. Tomographic reconstructions in the presence of Gaussian-distributed random noise demonstrated that the modified P–T method with only several iterations significantly reduced the mean reconstruction error by (30–50)% of the original root-mean-square error caused by the random noise.     

Laser pulse modulation instabilities in partially stripped plasma

The laser pulse modulation instabilities in partially stripped plasma were discussed based on the phase and group velocities of the laser pulse and the two processes that modulation instabilities excited. The excitation condition and growth rate of the modulation instability were obtained. It was found that the positive chirp and competition between normal and abnormal dispersions play important roles in the modulation instability. In the partially stripped plasma, the increased positive chirp enhances the modulation instability, and the dispersion competition reduces it.     

也谈对plasma一词的翻译

2006年第12期《物理》上发表了3篇针对Plasma一词汉译质疑的短文［1-3］,读后觉得很有意思。想想又觉得文中有些说法似乎并不合理,因此也想发表一点自己的看法,与大家讨论。     

Effect of E × B electron drift and plasma discharge in dc magnetron sputtering plasma

Study of electron drift velocity caused by Etimes B motion is done with the help of a Mach probe in a dc cylindrical magnetron sputtering system at different plasma discharge parameters like discharge voltage, gas pressure and applied magnetic field strength. The interplay of the electron drift with the different discharge parameters has been investigated. Strong radial variation of the electron drift velocity is observed and is found to be maximum near the cathode and it decreases slowly with the increase of radial distance from the cathode. The sheath electric field, E measured experimentally from potential profile curve using an emissive probe is contributed to the observed radial variation of the electron drift velocity. The measured values of the drift velocities are also compared with the values from the conventional theory using the experimental values of electric and magnetic fields. This study of the drift velocity variation is helpful in providing a useful insight for determining the discharge conditions and parameters for sputter deposition of thin film.     

Ohm’s law in a chiral plasma

The motion of plasma electrons in a stochastic electromagnetic field is studied in the low-conductivity limit. It is shown that under very general conditions, in the presence of a nonzero average chirality of the small-scale electromagnetic field, the effective current depends on the curl of the applied electric field, j=§ E+§_κcurl E, just as for similar dependences for the electric displacement and magnetic induction vectors in optically active and artificial chiral media. Under certain conditions such an Ohm’s law leads to growth of the magnetic field, the structure of the growth being dependent on the conductivity of the medium. Pis’ma Zh. éksp. Teor. Fiz. 70, No. 4, 268–273 (25 August 1999)     

Quark potential in a quark–meson plasma

We investigate the effect of the restoration of chiral symmetry on the quark potential in a quark–meson plasma by considering meson exchanges in the two flavor Nambu–Jona-Lasinio model at finite temperature and density. There are two possible oscillations in the chiral restoration phase; one is the Friedel oscillation due to the sharp quark Fermi surface at high density, and the other is the Yukawa oscillation driven by the complex meson poles at high temperature. The quark–meson plasma is strongly coupled in the temperature region 1≤T/T _c≤3, with T _c being the critical temperature of the chiral phase transition. The maximum coupling in this region is located at the phase transition point.     

也谈对plasma一词的翻译

2006年第12期《物理》上发表了3篇针对Plasma一词汉译质疑的短文，读后觉得很有意思。想想又觉得文中有些说法似乎并不合理，因此也想发表一点自己的看法，与大家讨论。     

Familon → photon transition in a magnetized plasma

The external-magnetic-field-induced interaction of a pseudoscalar particle with a photon is investigated in e^?e⁺ plasma. The familon arising upon the breakdown of a horizontal symmetry between fermion generations is considered for a pseudoscalar particle. The expressions for the plasma and the field contribution to the effective familon-photon coupling are derived in the limit of strongly magnetized plasma and the limit where the plasma being considered occurs in a relatively weak magnetic field.     

Spectroscopic estimation of plasma parameters,in the 100–400 ns stage,of a laser-induced plasma in vacuum

This work is focused on the interpretation of the emission spectra in laser-induced plasma observed in the phase at 100–400?ns from after the laser pulse, when the discrete emission lines prevail on the continuum emission, can be important to retrieve the initial stage of expansion. A Q-switched neodymium-doped yttrium aluminum garnet laser has been used for the ablation of a lead sample in vacuum. The observed line profiles, corresponding to different species of lead, were analyzed in terms of delay time. Measurements of parameters of the produced plasmas are performed. The results obtained corroborate the importance of considering nonequilibrium effects in the initial stage of plasma expansion. Also, Stark width for two spectral lines of triply ionized lead is given.     

Can ion-acoustic waves in plasma be backward waves?

The dispersion relation for ion-acoustic waves in plasma with ion flow has been analyzed. It is shown that these waves may exist (under certain conditions) in the form of backward waves with antiparallel group and phase velocities. The range of ion flow velocities allowing implementation of backward ion-acoustic waves is found.     

Thomson scattering off a pair （electron-positron） plasma

Thomson scattering off a pair (electron--positron) plasma is theoretically investigated in the collisionless and collisional limits respectively. Our calculations show that the power spectrum of the Thomson scattering off a collisionless pair plasma is just proportional to the velocity distribution function of the particles in the plasma. Collective modes in the plasma do not have any effects on the Thomson scattering spectrum because of the correlation between the negatively- and positively-charged particles. In the collisional limit, the power spectrum of the Thomson scattering presents three spikes: two peaks correspond to two contra-propagating sound waves and one peak corresponds to an entropy wave.