Abstract

AbstractA fundamental study describing nonlinear plasma wave propagation is presented. Elementary linear wave theory describes small‐amplitude random waves, but lacks information about coherent structures. This improved wave model arises from the fact that structure formation is inevitably associated with particle trapping, which can only be properly addressed by the pseudo‐potential method instead of Bernstein, Greene, and Kruskal (BGK) ‐ likemethods. Only by using this method can legitimate nonlinear dispersion relations be obtained and reconciled with trapping scenarios. This privilege is used to derive evolution equations for five structures, the derivation being simplified by the acoustic nature of the permitted modes. The focus is on a special structure, the solitary electron hole of negative polarity, with which it can explain a spacecraft observation for the first time. Furthermore, it is shown that an intrinsically nonlinear structure can become macroscopically linear and thus harmonic by suitably adjusting the trapping scenario. An example is the monochromatic ion acoustic wave that propagates at ion sound velocity without dispersion. In this literature research, it also takes a critical look at a recently awarded work.

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