Weakly relativistic and space charge effects in interaction of high-power microwave with plasma

Abstract

In the present work, numerical studies on the effects of weakly relativistic ponderomotive force and space charge in the nonlinear interaction of a high-power microwave beam with a plasma are carried out. It is shown that, the profiles of the electron density and dielectric permittivity contain high peaks, and modulation of wavelength occurs in electron density distribution by increasing the microwave energy flux. In addition, it is indicated that the profiles of the electric and magnetic fields in relativistic regime are lengthened more than non-relativistic regime by increasing the initial electron density and the relativistic effects cause the increase in oscillation wavelength of electron density, dielectric permittivity and space charge field, in comparison with the non-relativistic regime. Finally, the results of the research show that the steepening in electron density distributions and their oscillation wavelength are enhanced, when the relativistic effects appear.