Strong hydromagnetic disturbances in a collision-free plasma

Abstract

Listen

Translate article

Abstract An attempt is made to extend the exact pulse solutions found by Adlam and Allen (1958) at zero temperature to finite temperatures and the heating of the plasma is studiod. A linear treatment shows that the increase in the temperature is small except for very strong pulses. An approximate treatment of the gas pressure is found to be invalid for strong pulses at the experimental values of the initial temperature. Discussion of the ions which start with large thermal velocities shows that some of them are likely to gain energy, but that their effect on the field may be important at the experimental values.