Collective Modes in Inhomogeneous Plasmas: Kinetic and Advanced Fluid Theory presents the collective drift and MHD-type modes in inhomogeneous plasmas from the point of view of two-fluid and kinetic theory. Written by an internationally respected plasma transport theoretician, this introductory monograph emphasizes the description of the plasma rather than the geometry to present a more general approach to a large class of plasma problems. Starting with generalized fluid equations for low frequency phenomena, the author shows how drift waves and MHD-type modes can arise from the effects of inhomogeneities in the plasma. The kinetic description is then presented to reveal a host of phenomena ranging from vortex modes and finite Larmor radius effects to trapped and fast particle instabilities, transport, diffusion, and other advanced fluid effects. Theoretical and computational plasma physicists modeling confined plasmas will find this illustrated book a very valuable addition to their collection.

Anomalous transport is a ubiquitous phenomenon in astrophysical, geophysical and laboratory plasmas; and is a key topic in controlled nuclear fusion research. Despite its fundamental importance and ongoing research interest, a full understanding of anomalous transport in plasmas is still incomplete, due to the complexity of the nonlinear phenomena involved. Aspects in Anomalous Transport in Plasmas is the first book to systematically consider anomalous plasma transport theory and provides a unification of the many theoretical models by emphasizing interrelations between seemingly different methodologies. It is not intended as a catalogue of the vast number of plasma instabilities leading to anomalous transport; instead it chooses a number of these and emphasizes the aspects specifically due to turbulence. After a brief introduction, the microscopic theory of turbulence is discussed, including quasilinear theory and various aspects of renormalization methods, which leads to an understanding of resonance broadening, mode coupling, trajectory correlation and clumps. The second half of the book is devoted to stochiastic tramsport, using methods based on the Langevin equations and on Random Walk theory. This treatment aims at going beyond the traditional limits of weak turbulence, by introducing the recently developed method of decorrelation trajectories, and its application to electrostatic turbulence, magnetic turbulence and zonal flow generation. The final chapter includes very recent work on the nonlocal transport phenomenon.

A nonlinearity is one of the most important notions in modern physics. A plasma is rich in nonlinearities and provides a variety of behaviors inherent to instabilities, coherent wave structures and turbulence. The book covers the basic concepts and mathematical methods, necessary to comprehend nonlinear problems widely encountered in contemporary plasmas, but also in other fields of physics and current research on self-organized structures and magnetized plasma turbulence. The analyses make use of strongly nonlinear models solved by analytical techniques backed by extensive simulations and available experiments. The text is written for senior undergraduates, graduate students, lecturers and researchers in laboratory, space and fusion plasmas.

The book describes a statistical approach to the basics of plasma physics.

For the first time in a single book, Non-Linear Instabilities in Plasmas and Hydrodynamics presents the underlying physics of fast secondary instabilities. This exceptionally well-written, introductory book discusses the basic ideas of the physics of secondary or induced, nonlinear instabilities in wave-sustaining media. The authors, world-renowned experts in the field, have brought together the results of papers scattered throughout the literature to explain subjects as diverse as fluctuation chaos, wave-turbulent instabilities, vortex dynamos, beam-plasma interactions, plasma confinement, and the origins of typhoons in the Earth's atmosphere and magnetic fields in galaxies. Paving the way for new and exciting research in the future, this broad, interdisciplinary book enables a wide range of physicists to apply the concepts discussed to obtain new results in plasma physics, space physics, hydrodynamics, and geophysics.

Complex plasmas are dusty plasmas in which the density and electric charges of the dust grains are sufficiently high to induce long-range grain-grain interactions, as well as strong absorption of charged-plasma components. Together with the sources replenishing the plasma such systems form a highly dissipative thermodynamically open system that exhibits many features of collective behaviour generally found in complex systems. Most notably among them are self-organized patterns such as plasma crystals, plasma clusters, dust stars and further spectacular new structures. Beyond their intrinsic scientific interest, the study of complex plasmas grows in importance in a great variety of fields, ranging from space-plasma sciences to applied fields such as plasma processing, thin-film deposition and even the production of computer chips by plasma etching, in which strongly interacting clouds of complex plasmas can cause major contamination of the final product. Intended as first introductory but comprehensive survey of this rapidly emerging field, the present book addresses postgraduate students as well as specialist and nonspecialist researchers with a general background in either plasma physics, space sciences or the physics of complex systems.

Developing the physical kinetics of plasma turbulence through a focus on quasi-particle models and dynamics, this volume will interest researchers and graduate students in plasma physics. It discusses essential physics concepts and theoretical methods for weak and strong fluid and phase space turbulence in plasma systems far from equilibrium.