The importance of radiative scattering in heated heavy ion plasmas

TL;DR

This paper emphasizes the critical role of radiative scattering in energy transport within heated heavy ion plasmas, especially at high temperatures, by analyzing photon-electron interactions and their impact on plasma behavior.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive model that incorporates scattering effects, including Klein-Nishina and angular momentum contributions, into plasma energy transport calculations.

Findings

Radiative scattering significantly affects energy transport in high-temperature plasmas.

Transport correction due to scattering alters plasma energy balance.

Scattering effects vary with plasma density and temperature.

Abstract

The transport of energy in heated plasmas requires the knowledge of the radiation coefficients. These coefficients consist of contribution of bremsstrahlung, photoionisation, bound-bound transmissions and scattering. Scattering of photons on electrons is taken into account by the model of Thomson, Klein-Nishina and the first order angular momentum of Klein-Nishina. It is shown that radiative scattering becomes an important part of energy transport in high temperature plasmas. Moreover, the contribution of transport correction to scattering is taken into account. The physics is discussed on the example of a heated plutonium plasma at different particle densities and temperatures in radiative equilibrium.