The electromagnetic instabilities propagation in weak relativistic quantum plasmas

TL;DR

This paper investigates how weak relativistic quantum effects, especially those related to electron spin, influence electromagnetic instabilities in high-density plasmas, with implications for astrophysics and inertial confinement fusion.

Contribution

It introduces a model incorporating weak relativistic spin effects into plasma instability analysis, highlighting their significance in astrophysical contexts.

Findings

Weak relativistic effects increase instability growth rates.

Spin effects can reduce electron capture probability.

Quantum spin effects are negligible in ICF but significant in astrophysics.

Abstract

The electromagnetic instabilities excited by the temperature anisotropy have been always one of the interesting issues in real high-density physical systems, where the relativistic and quantum effects due to spin can be important. This paper discusses the case where plasma is not strongly coupled but is still in regimes where a classic plasma description is not fully adequate. The length scale of the plasma can be larger than the de-Broglie length so that the quantum effects relevance to the spin can be significant. In addition, the only relativistic effects are due to the electrons spin, for example the spin-orbit coupling effect (the weak (semi) relativistic effects). Obtained results imply that these effects can not be important in the ICF subjects while these can lead to significant results in the astrophysical subjects because of the strong magnetic fields. It is found that the weakly relativistic effects can cover the magnetic dipole force and the spin precession effects so that the growth rate of the instability can increase compared to the non relativistic spin polarized cases. Indeed, it is expected that the probability of electron capture in the background magnetic fields and the particle energy dissipation will be reduced so that there will be a high portion of free energy in the system.