Negative-mass Instability in Nonlinear Plasma Waves

Dodin, I. Y. ; Schmit, P. F. ; Rocks, J. ; Fisch, N. J.

关键词: Trapped-particle instability;    Nonlinear Effects;    Oscillations;    Nonlinear;   

DOI  :  10.2172/1062398
RP-ID  :  PPPL-4849
PID  :  OSTI ID: 1062398

学科分类：物理（综合）

美国|英语

来源: SciTech Connect

【 摘 要 】

The negative-mass instability (NMI), previously found in ion traps, appears as a distinct regime of the sideband instability in nonlinear plasma waves with trapped particles. As the bounce frequency of these particles decreases with the bounce action, bunching can occur if the action distribution is inverted in trapping islands. In contrast to existing theories that also infer instabilities from the anharmonicity of bounce oscillations, spatial periodicity of the islands turns out to be unimportant, and the particle distribution can be unstable even if it is at at the resonance. An analytical model is proposed which describes both single traps and periodic nonlinear waves and concisely generalizes the conventional description of the sideband instability in plasma waves. The theoretical results are supported by particle-in-cell simulations carried out for a regime accentuating the NMI effect.