Damping of electromagnetic waves in low-collision electron-ion plasmas

TL;DR

This paper develops a new method to analyze electromagnetic wave damping in low-collision plasmas, confirming previous results and providing insights into boundary conditions for wave elimination.

Contribution

It introduces a novel iteration procedure for Coulomb collision effects in plasma wave dispersion analysis, differing from prior methods.

Findings

Collisionally damped electromagnetic waves in plasma.

Decrements for wave modes match previous results when neglecting higher-order terms.

Method allows determination of boundary conditions to eliminate backward and kinematical waves.

Abstract

Using previously developed method of two-dimensional Laplace transform we obtain the characteristic equations k(\omega) for electromagnetic waves in low-collision fully ionized plasma of a plane geometry. We apply here a new, different from the one used in our previous paper, iteration procedure of taking into account the Coulomb collisions. The waves are collisionally damping in the same extent as electromagnetic waves. Despite the different from previous paper form of the dispersion (poles) equation, the obtained decrements for fast and slow wave modes coincide with results obtained in our earlier paper, if one neglects the terms of higher orders in v^2/c^2, (v and c are electron and light velocities). We point out how one can determine mutually dependent boundary conditions allowing to eliminate simultaneously both the backward and kinematical waves for transversal as well as for longitudinal oscillations.