Microscopic dynamics of plasmas and chaos: the wave–particle interaction paradigm

Abstract

The wave–particle interaction is central to microscopic plasma dynamics. A paradigm of such an interaction is one occurring during the weak warm beam–plasma instability: a Langmuir turbulence sets in and saturates by the formation of a plateau in the particle distribution function. A new approach permits us to deal with the regular and chaotic aspects of this problem using the classical mechanics of the corresponding N-body problem only. The classical Landau-van Kampen theory is recovered by using mathematical tools not more intricate than a finite Fourier sum. A single calculation yields spontaneous emission and the particle dynamics as well; classical explicative models of Landau damping are found to be misleading. Recent tools of Hamiltonian chaos enable us to derive the quasilinear equations in the regime of saturation of the instability. The calculations are readable by graduate students and provide a simple solution to a 20 year old controversy in the Vlasovian frame. As a result, the macroscopic irreversible evolution of a plasma is described by fully accounting for its microscopic reversible mechanics; for the first time, an old dream of the 19th century comes true: the irreversible evolution of an N-body problem is described by taking into account the true character of its chaotic motion.