Oscillations of an isotropic relativistic plasma

Abstract

An analytic study of electrostatic and electromagnetic oscillations of an isotropic relativistic plasma is presented in order to correlate separate results obtained by different authors and to form a general qualitative picture of the oscillation branches of such a plasma. It is shown that at any plasma temperature there is only one dispersion curve of slightly damped (or undamped) electrostatic oscillations. Separate parts of this dispersion curve are, however, described by different analytic formulas depending on the plasma temperature and the ratio of the phase velocity to the characteristic velocity of the particles. Considerable attention is given to the study of the dispersion of subluminous electrostatic waves and their damping since such waves may be responsible for the electrostatic beam instabilities. It is concluded that there are two kinds of electromagnetic oscillations, i.e. normal superluminous nondamping and subluminous aperiodically damping oscillations.