Waves of finite amplitude in a hot plasma

Abstract

A study is made of a plane shock wave of arbitrary strength propagating in a hot rarefied plasma across the magnetic field. The question of the propagation of nonstationary waves of finite but small amplitude under these conditions is examined.

Fairly detailed studies have been made of waves of finite amplitude in a cold rarefied plasma. The profile of such waves is formed as the result of nonlinear and dispersion effects, the dispersion effects being caused by electron inertia and plasma anisotropy. If the gas-kinetic pressure of the plasma is taken into account, then dispersion effects appear which are associated with the fact that the Larmor radius of the ions is finite. Stationary waves of small but finite amplitude propagating across the magnetic field in a hot plasma (when the gas-kinetic pressure p is comparable with the magnetic pressure H²/87Π) have been treated in [1, 2]. In [1] an isolated rarefaction wave was found in a hot plasma, instead of the compression wave characteristic of a cold plasma, and a qualitative picture of the shock wave structure was given. In [2] a study was made of a small-amplitude shock wave with the finite size of the ion Larmor radius taken into account. The present paper investigates the structure of shock waves of arbitrary strength which propagate across the magnetic field in a fairly hot rarefied plasma, and also examines nonstationary waves of finite but small amplitude excited in a plasma by a “ magnetic piston” acting over a limited time interval.