We study the longitudinal stability of beam–plasma systems in the presence of a density inhomogeneity in the background plasma. Previous works have focused on the non-relativistic regime where hydrodynamical models are used to evolve pre-existing Langmuir waves within inhomogeneous background plasmas. Here, for the first time we study the problem with kinetic equations in a fully relativistic way. We do not assume the existence of Langmuir waves, and we focus on the rate and the mechanism by which waves are excited in such systems from an initial perturbation. We derive the structure of the unstable modes and compute an analytical approximation for their growth rates. Our computation is limited to dilute and cold beams, and shows an excellent agreement with particle-in-cell simulations performed using the SHARP code. We show that, due to such an inhomogeneity, the virulent beam–plasma instabilities in the intergalactic medium are not suppressed but their counterparts in the solar wind can be suppressed as evidenced by propagating type-III solar radio bursts.

Monte Carlo methods are often employed to numerically integrate kinetic equations, such as the particle-in-cell method for the plasma kinetic equation, but these methods suffer from the introduction of counting noise to the solution. We report on a cautionary tale of counting noise modifying the nonlinear saturation of kinetic instabilities driven by unstable beams of plasma. We find a saturated magnetic field in under-resolved particle-in-cell simulations due to the sampling error in the current density. The noise-induced magnetic field is anomalous, as the magnetic field damps away in continuum kinetic and increased particle count particle-in-cell simulations. This modification of the saturated state has implications for a broad array of astrophysical phenomena beyond the simple plasma system considered here, and it stresses the care that must be taken when using particle methods for kinetic equations.

We describe here efforts to create and study magnetized electron–positron pair plasmas, the existence of which in astrophysical environments is well-established. Laboratory incarnations of such systems are becoming ever more possible due to novel approaches and techniques in plasma, beam and laser physics. Traditional magnetized plasmas studied to date, both in nature and in the laboratory, exhibit a host of different wave types, many of which are generically unstable and evolve into turbulence or violent instabilities. This complexity and the instability of these waves stem to a large degree from the difference in mass between the positively and the negatively charged species: the ions and the electrons. The mass symmetry of pair plasmas, on the other hand, results in unique behaviour, a topic that has been intensively studied theoretically and numerically for decades, but experimental studies are still in the early stages of development. A levitated dipole device is now under construction to study magnetized low-energy, short-Debye-length electron–positron plasmas; this experiment, as well as a stellarator device that is in the planning stage, will be fuelled by a reactor-based positron source and make use of state-of-the-art positron cooling and storage techniques. Relativistic pair plasmas with very different parameters will be created using pair production resulting from intense laser–matter interactions and will be confined in a high-field mirror configuration. We highlight the differences between and similarities among these approaches, and discuss the unique physics insights that can be gained by these studies.

Mechanisms setting the density decay in the scrape-off layer (SOL) at the outer midplane of a tokamak plasma are disentangled using two-fluid numerical simulations in a double-null magnetic configuration and analytical estimates. Typical experimental observations are retrieved, in particular increasing intermittency of the turbulence going from the near to the far SOL, which is reflected in two different density decay lengths. The decay length of the near SOL is well described as the result of transport driven by a nonlinearly saturated ballooning instability, while in the far SOL, the density decay length is described using a model of intermittent transport mediated by blobs. The analytical estimates of the decay lengths agree well with the simulation results and typical experimental values and can therefore be used to guide tokamak design and operation.

The rapidly emerging technology of high-temperature superconductors (HTS) opens new opportunities for the development of non-planar non-insulated HTS magnets. This type of HTS magnet offers attractive features via its simplicity and robustness, and is well suited for modest size steady-state applications such as a mid-scale stellarator. In non-planar coil applications the HTS tape may be subject to severe hard-way bending strain ($\epsilon _{\textrm {bend}}$), torsional strains ($\epsilon _{\textrm {tor}}$) and magnetic field components transverse to the HTS tape plane ($B_{\perp }$), all of which can limit the magnet operating space. A novel method of winding angle optimization is here presented to overcome these limitations for fixed input non-planar coil filamentary geometry. Essentially, this method: (i) calculates the peak $\epsilon _{\textrm {bend}}$ and $B_{\perp }$ for arbitrary winding angle along an input coil filamentary trajectory, (ii) defines a cost function including both and then (iii) uses tensioned splines to define a winding angle that reduces $\epsilon _{\textrm {tor}}$ and optimizes the $\epsilon _{\textrm {bend}}$ and $B_{\perp }$ cost function. As strain limits are present even without $B_{\perp }$, this optimization is able to provide an assessment of the minimum buildable size of an arbitrary non-planar non-insulating HTS coil. This optimization finds that for standard 4 mm wide HTS tapes the minimum size coils of the existing HSX, NCSX and W7-X stellarator geometries are around 0.3–0.5 m in mean coil radius. Identifying the minimum size provides a path to specify a mid-scale stellarator capable of achieving high-field or high-temperature operation with minimal HTS tape length. For coils larger than this size, strain optimization allows use of wider (higher current capacity) HTS tapes or alternatively permitting a finite (yet tolerable) strain allows reduction of $B_{\perp }$. Reduced $B_{\perp }$ enables a reduction of the HTS tape length required to achieve a given design magnetic field or equivalently an increase in the achievable magnetic field for fixed HTS tape length. The distinct considerations for optimizing a stellarator coilset to further ease compatibility with non-insulated HTS magnets are also discussed, highlighting relaxed curvature limits and the introduction of limits to the allowable torsion.

We develop a simple model for the kinematics of charged particles in regions of magnetic turbulence. We approximate the local magnetic field as smoothly varying in strength and direction, where adiabatic invariance prevails, or as presenting rapid changes in direction or ‘kinks’. Particles execute guiding centre gyromotion around a field line. However, in analogy to kinetic theory for collisional environments, when the particle undergoes a rapid change in direction by some angle $\unicode[STIX]{x1D703}$, it would instantaneously transition to Larmor motion around the new field line. This mimics Brownian motion wherein we replace collisions with other particles by rapid transitions or ‘collisions’ with other field lines. Using standard methods drawn from Brownian motion, we follow the evolution of the parallel and perpendicular components of the velocity, namely $v_{\Vert }$ and $v_{\bot }$, and rigorously show that kinetic energy isotropization necessarily emerges.

The purpose of this paper is to bridge kinetic plasma descriptions and low-frequency single-fluid models. More specifically, the asymptotics leading to magnetohydrodynamic regimes starting from the Vlasov–Maxwell system are investigated. The analogy with the derivation, from the Vlasov–Poisson system, of a fluid representation for ions coupled to the Boltzmann relation for electrons is also outlined. The aim is to identify asymptotic parameters explaining the transitions from one microscopic description to a macroscopic low-frequency model. These investigations provide groundwork for the derivation of multi-scale numerical methods, model coupling or physics-based preconditioning.

A fluid system is derived to describe electrostatic magnetized plasma turbulence at scales somewhat larger than the Larmor radius of a given species. It is related to the Hasegawa–Mima equation, but does not conserve enstrophy, and, as a result, exhibits a forward cascade of energy, to small scales. The inertial-range energy spectrum is argued to be shallower than a $-11/3$ power law, as compared to the $-5$ law of the Hasegawa–Mima enstrophy cascade. This property, confirmed here by direct numerical simulations of the fluid system, may help explain the fluctuation spectrum observed in gyrokinetic simulations of streamer-dominated electron-temperature-gradient driven turbulence (Plunk et al., Phys. Rev. Lett., vol. 122, 2019, 035002), and also possibly some cases of ion-temperature-gradient driven turbulence where zonal flows are suppressed (Plunk et al., Phys. Rev. Lett., vol. 118, 2017, 105002).

The onset of magnetic reconnection in space, astrophysical and laboratory plasmas is reviewed discussing results from theory, numerical simulations and observations. After a brief introduction on magnetic reconnection and approach to the question of onset, we first discuss recent theoretical models and numerical simulations, followed by observations of reconnection and its effects in space and astrophysical plasmas from satellites and ground-based detectors, as well as measurements of reconnection in laboratory plasma experiments. Mechanisms allowing reconnection spanning from collisional resistivity to kinetic effects as well as partial ionization are described, providing a description valid over a wide range of plasma parameters, and therefore applicable in principle to many different astrophysical and laboratory environments. Finally, we summarize the implications of reconnection onset physics for plasma dynamics throughout the Universe and illustrate how capturing the dynamics correctly is important to understanding particle acceleration. The goal of this review is to give a view on the present status of this topic and future interesting investigations, offering a unified approach.

Plasma terminating disruptions in tokamaks may result in relativistic runaway electron beams with potentially serious consequences for future devices with large plasma currents. In this paper, we investigate the effect of plasma elongation on the coupled dynamics of runaway generation and resistive diffusion of the electric field. We find that elongated plasmas are less likely to produce large runaway currents, partly due to the lower induced electric fields associated with larger plasmas, and partly due to direct shaping effects, which mainly lead to a reduction in the runaway avalanche gain.

The creation of well-thermalized, hot and dense plasmas is attractive for warm dense matter studies. We investigate collisionally induced energy absorption of an ultraintense and ultrashort laser pulse in a solid copper target using particle-in-cell simulations. We find that, upon irradiation by a $2\times 10^{20}~\text{W}\,\text{cm}^{-2}$ intensity, 60 fs duration, circularly polarized laser pulse, the electrons in the collisional simulation rapidly reach a well-thermalized distribution with ${\sim}3.5~\text{keV}$ temperature, while in the collisionless simulation the absorption is several orders of magnitude weaker. Circular polarization inhibits the generation of suprathermal electrons, while ensuring efficient bulk heating through inverse bremsstrahlung, a mechanism usually overlooked at relativistic laser intensity. An additional simulation, taking account of both collisional and field ionization, yields similar results: the bulk electrons are heated to ${\sim}2.5~\text{keV}$, but with a somewhat lower degree of thermalization than in the pre-set, fixed-ionization case. The collisional absorption mechanism is found to be robust against variations in the laser parameters. At fixed laser pulse energy, increasing the pulse duration rather than the intensity leads to a higher electron temperature.

A runaway avalanche can result in a conversion of the initial plasma current into a relativistic electron beam in high-current tokamak disruptions. We investigate the effect of massive material injection of deuterium–noble gas mixtures on the coupled dynamics of runaway generation, resistive diffusion of the electric field and temperature evolution during disruptions in the deuterium–tritium phase of ITER operations. We explore the dynamics over a wide range of injected concentrations and find substantial runaway currents, unless the current quench time is intolerably long. The reason is that the cooling associated with the injected material leads to high induced electric fields that, in combination with a significant recombination of hydrogen isotopes, leads to a large avalanche generation. Balancing Ohmic heating and radiation losses provides qualitative insights into the dynamics; however, an accurate modelling of the temperature evolution based on energy balance appears crucial for quantitative predictions.

We investigate kinetic entropy-based measures of the non-Maxwellianity of distribution functions in plasmas, i.e. entropy-based measures of the departure of a local distribution function from an associated Maxwellian distribution function with the same density, bulk flow and temperature as the local distribution. First, we consider a form previously employed by Kaufmann & Paterson (J. Geophys. Res., vol. 114, 2009, A00D04), assessing its properties and deriving equivalent forms. To provide a quantitative understanding of it, we derive analytical expressions for three common non-Maxwellian plasma distribution functions. We show that there are undesirable features of this non-Maxwellianity measure including that it can diverge in various physical limits and elucidate the reason for the divergence. We then introduce a new kinetic entropy-based non-Maxwellianity measure based on the velocity-space kinetic entropy density, which has a meaningful physical interpretation and does not diverge. We use collisionless particle-in-cell simulations of two-dimensional anti-parallel magnetic reconnection to assess the kinetic entropy-based non-Maxwellianity measures. We show that regions of non-zero non-Maxwellianity are linked to kinetic processes occurring during magnetic reconnection. We also show the simulated non-Maxwellianity agrees reasonably well with predictions for distributions resembling those calculated analytically. These results can be important for applications, as non-Maxwellianity can be used to identify regions of kinetic-scale physics or increased dissipation in plasmas.

Using particle-in-cell simulations, we demonstrate an improvement of the target-normal-sheath acceleration (TNSA) of protons in non-periodically nanostructured targets with micron-scale thickness. Compared to standard flat foils, an increase in the proton cutoff energy by up to a factor of two is observed in foils coated with nanocones or perforated with nanoholes. The latter nano-perforated foils yield the highest enhancement, which we show to be robust over a broad range of foil thicknesses and hole diameters. The improvement of TNSA performance results from more efficient hot-electron generation, caused by a more complex laser–electron interaction geometry and increased effective interaction area and duration. We show that TNSA is optimized for a nanohole distribution of relatively low areal density and that is not required to be periodic, thus relaxing the manufacturing constraints.

The confinement of energetic particles in nuclear fusion devices is studied in the presence of an oscillating radial electric field and an axisymmetric magnetic equilibrium. It is shown that, despite the poloidal and toroidal symmetries, initially integrable orbits turn into chaotic regions that can potentially intercept the wall of the tokamak, leading to particle losses. It is observed that the losses exhibit algebraic time decay different from the expected exponential decay characteristic of radial diffusive transport. A dynamical explanation of this behaviour is presented, within the continuous time random walk theory. The central point of the analysis is based on the fact that, contrary to the radial displacement, the poloidal angle is not bounded and a proper statistical analysis can therefore be made, showing for the first time that energetic particle transport can be super-diffusive in the poloidal direction and characterised by asymmetric poloidal displacement. The connection between poloidal and radial positions ensured by the conservation of the toroidal canonical momentum, implies that energetic particles spend statistically more time in the inner region of the tokamak than in the outer one, which explains the observed algebraic decay. This indicates that energetic particles might be efficiently slowed down by the thermal population before leaving the system. Also, the asymmetric transport reveals a new possible mechanism of self-generation of momentum.

In this paper we study the effects of the net magnetic helicity density on the hemispheric symmetry of the dynamo generated large-scale magnetic field. Our study employs the axisymmetric dynamo model which takes into account the nonlinear effect of magnetic helicity conservation. We find that, on the surface, the net magnetic helicity follows the evolution of the parity of the large-scale magnetic field. Random fluctuations of the $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FC}$-effect and the helicity fluxes can invert the causal relationship, i.e. the net magnetic helicity or the imbalance of magnetic helicity fluxes can drive the magnetic parity breaking. We also found that evolution of the net magnetic helicity of the small-scale fields follows the evolution of the net magnetic helicity of the large-scale fields with some time lag. We interpret this as an effect of the difference of the magnetic helicity fluxes out of the Sun from the large and small scales.

While it is well known that every nearly periodic Hamiltonian system possesses an adiabatic invariant, extant methods for computing terms in the adiabatic invariant series are inefficient. The most popular method involves the heavy intermediate calculation of a non-unique near-identity coordinate transformation, even though the adiabatic invariant itself is a uniquely defined scalar. A less well-known method, developed by S. Omohundro, avoids calculating intermediate sequences of coordinate transformations but is also inefficient as it involves its own sequence of complex intermediate calculations. In order to improve the efficiency of future calculations of adiabatic invariants, we derive generally applicable, readily computable formulas for the first several terms in the adiabatic invariant series. To demonstrate the utility of these formulas, we apply them to charged-particle dynamics in a strong magnetic field and magnetic field-line dynamics when the field lines are nearly closed.

We report on an analytical and numerical study of the dynamics of a three-dimensional array of identical magnetic flux tubes in the reduced-magnetohydrodynamic description of the plasma. We propose that the long-time evolution of this system is dictated by flux-tube mergers, and that such mergers are dynamically constrained by the conservation of the pertinent (ideal) invariants, viz. the magnetic potential and axial fluxes of each tube. We also propose that in the direction perpendicular to the merging plane, flux tubes evolve in a critically balanced fashion. These notions allow us to construct an analytical model for how quantities such as the magnetic energy and the energy-containing scale evolve as functions of time. Of particular importance is the conclusion that, like its two-dimensional counterpart, this system exhibits an inverse transfer of magnetic energy that terminates only at the system scale. We perform direct numerical simulations that confirm these predictions and reveal other interesting aspects of the evolution of the system. We find, for example, that the early time evolution is characterized by a sharp decay of the initial magnetic energy, which we attribute to the ubiquitous formation of current sheets. We also show that a quantitatively similar inverse transfer of magnetic energy is observed when the initial condition is a random, small-scale magnetic seed field.

A non-parametric Gaussian process regression model is developed in the three-dimensional equilibrium reconstruction code V3FIT. A Gaussian process is a normal distribution of functions that is uniquely defined by specifying a mean function and covariance kernel function. Gaussian process regression assumes that an unknown profile belongs to a particular Gaussian process and uses Bayesian analysis to select the function the give the best fit to measured data. The implementation in V3FIT uses a hybrid representation where Gaussian processes are used to infer some of the equilibrium profiles and standard parametric techniques are used to infer the remaining profiles. The implementation of the Gaussian process is tested using both synthetic data and experimental data from multiple machines.