Potential of mean force for electrical conductivity of dense plasmas

TL;DR

This paper introduces a new potential of mean force for calculating electrical conductivity in dense plasmas, leading to improved agreement with experiments and benchmark calculations by self-consistently including ionic structure, screening, and ionization effects.

Contribution

A novel potential of mean force is proposed for dense plasma conductivity calculations, enhancing accuracy over existing approximations.

Findings

Significantly improved agreement with experimental data.

Better consistency with benchmark calculations.

Includes ionic structure, screening, and ionization effects self-consistently.

Abstract

The electrical conductivity in dense plasmas can be calculated with the relaxation-time approximation provided that the interaction potential between the scattering electron and the ion is known. To date there has been considerable uncertainty as to the best way to define this interaction potential so that it correctly includes the effects of ionic structure, screening by electrons and partial ionization. Current approximations lead to significantly different results with varying levels of agreement when compared to bench-mark calculations and experiments. We present a new way to define this potential, drawing on ideas from classical fluid theory to define a potential of mean force. This new potential results in significantly improved agreement with experiments and bench mark calculations, and includes all the aforementioned physics self-consistently.