Plasma screening effect in ion-ion scattering

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When a plasma is extremely dense or hot, the electrons lose their efficiency for stopping heavy charged particles. The main process for their slowing down then is the small-angle ion-ion scattering, where the bare Coulomb cross section becomes infinite as ${\ensuremath{\theta}}^{\ensuremath{-}4}$. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the collective screening effects which make the ion Coulomb cross section finite. The calculations are performed in the random-phase approximation and show that the Coulomb cross section is essentially cut off for energy transfers smaller than $\ensuremath{\hbar}{\ensuremath{\omega}}_{p}$, where ${\ensuremath{\omega}}_{p}$ is the plasma frequency of the ions.