P/1330 Japan
Cyclotron Radiation from a Magnetized Plasma
By S. Hayakawa,* N. Hokkyo,| Y. Terashima* and T. Tsuneto*
For the investigation of physical properties of a The radiation has a line spectrum, the emission plasma and for the interpretation of solar radio out- frequencies being the integral multiples of the cyclo- bursts, an important clue may be provided by the tron frequency, cyclotron radiation emitted by electrons gyrating 6 1 v = СО /2ТГ = еН /27ттс ^ 2.8 x 10 Я sec" (1.3) around a static magneticfield. Wit h regard to this we c С 0 0 treat two particular problems concerning the effect of where #o is the magnetic field strength in gauss. In fluctuating electric fields; one is the purely random most practical cases, however, œc is smaller than the fluctuation which brings about the resonance width and 2 plasma frequency cop = (4тте пе/п1)*, so that the the other the organized plasma oscillation which may cyclotron radiation cannot occur, except for its higher give rise to induced emission. The resonance width is harmonics of weak intensity. shown to be related to the slowing-down time of an The relative importance of the above two modes may electron and the spectral distribution for the dipole be compared by observing that radiation is derived under the approximation in which both the higher moment of the resonance shape and dWb /dWc dt the coherence of radiations from a number of electrons / dt " 77 U/ Я 1*27 We/ ne are neglected. The angular distribution of the induced (1.4) emission is expressed in a closed form that can be and readily reduced to the formula neglecting the effect of (cop/o) )2 = 2 the plasma oscillation. Since the general formula is too c S 1.0хЮ-%е#(Г . lengthy, we give explicit expressions only at particular The comparison indicates that the cyclotron radiation directions. becomes important if the magnetic energy density is comparable to the electron mass energy density. Such I. INTRODUCTION a condition seems to exist in active celestial regions, It is well known that a high-temperature plasma such as in a part of the Crab nebula and in the vicinity loses energy by bremsstrahlung, according to the of an active sun spot. It is not impossible to provide formula calculated with the Born approximation, as such a condition in laboratory experiments. If the cyclotron radiation from a plasma is 16 /8 2 kT\* i e* \ (1.1) observable, it is also feasible to observe the cyclotron at 3 nc \m ) \mc2/ absorption of electro-magnetic waves by the plasma. where Ze, m, с, 2тгЙ and k are the ionic charge, electron The absorption coefficient for the dipole mode is given mass, light velocity, Planck constant and Boltzmann by constant, respectively. Measuring the electron tem- perature, T, in degrees Kelvin and the electron and ion 3 This indicates absorption at a sharply defined fre- densities, ne and щ respectively, in cm" , the rate of energy loss is expressed by quency, but actually there is a finite absorption width due to the modulation of the gyrating motion of dW- s 1.6 x \Q-^Z4i% Ti erg sec"1 cm-з (1.1') electrons caused by fluctuating electric fields. The dt Q width is closely connected with the slowing-down time 1 If there exists a magnetic field in a plasma, the so- of an electron. In Sec. 2 we shall show that the called cyclotron radiation is expected to compete with reciprocal width is essentially equal to the slowing- the bremsstrahlung. The energy loss due to this down time for dipole radiation; the relation between process would be them becomes complicated for multipole radiations. 2 The modulation of the electron motion by fluctua- dW 4e kT c ting electricfields give s rise not only to the dissipation dt which results in the emission width or absorption ~ 5.4 x erg sec"1 ст~з (1.2) width, but also to a forced motion of electrons that * Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan. converts the energy of plasma oscillations to radiation, •f Hitachi Central Institute, Tokyo, Japan. provided that the fluctuation forms an organized 385 386 SESSION A-10 P/1330 S. HAYAKAWA et al. motion over a long period. This mechanism has been V(TI)-V(T2) over the great number of electrons. Thus discussed by Field,2 aiming at the interpretation of the problem is reduced tofinding thi s autocorrelation solar radio outbursts. In Sec. 3 we shall extend his of the velocities of electrons from the equation (2.1), work to a more general case and give an expression, the proper treatment of which would be quite difficult for the intensity of the radiation, that can be directly and beyond the scope of the present work. In order to compared with that for the spontaneous cyclotron obtain the approximate value for it, we rewrite Eq. radiation; the latter having also been regarded as a (2.1) in the form of the Langevin equation, separating 3 possible mechanism for the solar radio outbursts. the systematic part from Ef :
dv/dt = - (e/mc) [v x Ho] - 77 v+F (2.4) 2. COLLISION BROADENING OF CYCLOTRON RADIATION where F is supposed to be purely random and the friction coefficient, rj, is assumed to be constant. Since in transport phenomena in a plasma the Further we shall take into account only the average distant collisions play a more important role than the behavior represented by 77, discarding the effect of close collisions, we may expect that the distant diffusion due to F in the velocity space. Then it is collisions would be dominant in bringing about the easily shown that broadening of the cyclotron radiation of electrons. The 2-Ti)e-^2-ni. (2.5) width due to the close collisions is estimated, according
(2.2) J-TI2 where D and TR are the Debye shielding radius and where Ro and R are the distances from the point of the Rutherford scattering radius, respectively, for an observation to the center of gyration and to the electron with mean kinetic energy. The width obtained electron respectively, and T = 2тг/соо. We shall restrict in this way is apparently tc/ts ^ (4/3)1п(1)/?д) times our discussions to the dipole radiation, in which case A greater than the one due to the close collisions, where will become ts = 1/77 denotes the slowing down time. /•T/2 oo As was emphasized before, the above discussions A= - V(T) У are only of a qualitative nature, so that it might be J-TI2, w=-o relevant here to add some remarks about the assump- The expression for the total intensity of the dipole tions we have made, thereby pointing out possible radiation turns out to be, on averaging over the improvements in the theory. In the first place, the period T, which is taken to be sufficiently long radiation emitted from individual electrons has been assumed to be entirely incoherent, the correlation between the motions of electrons resulting from mutual collisions ignored. It seems that, if taken into account, this wül make the width narrower. Secondly, we have taken the expression (2.5) for
din %\JÁx)\\ (3.4) dQ % J with / со2 , Sin 0L Sin 0 + COS 0L COS 0 (3.4') x = 2 2 mew \co —coc (2) For ф = ir/2, we have
¿ ¿ ¿ m — wc ) sin2 sin2 a cos (3.5) aül 2) ^ + ( ^ь sin 0 sin a - Jf™^ 2 sin 0L cos 0 cos X\ ^ \Jn{y) \ with
пеЕъ 2 2 2 2 cos 0 cos 0+, sin 0 sin a = tan-i cot 0 cot в). (3.5') У = mco) L ( L L (3) For 0 = 7T-/2, we have
2 2 2 2 dln n e /^ь\ /Г\ 2 C0S 3 C0S r 2 2 2, sm ' COS ф sin )8 + a> sin ф cos j8) |JV( ¿Л 2тгс \ w / Ц (CÜ -COC )
2 2 2 2 + cos 0L sin в+ 7—5-^—57^ sin 0L(^C COS ф COS в—W sin ¿ sin B) 1 —o| Jw( (3.6) ¿ ¿ л/> ^ ' j^á CÜC ) ' ^ with neEj, sin 0 2 2 2 2 (3.6') :(o) cos ф + а>с sin ]3 = tan-l{(w/o>c) cot ^}. In this case, however, there occur complicated stop bands, which should be taken into account when our results are compared with observations.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 2. G. B. Field, Astrophys. J., 124, 555 (1956). Our thanks are due to Professor S. Nakajima and 3. U. E. Kruse, L. Marshall and J. R. Platt, Astrophys. J., Dr. M. Yokota for their critical but helpful discussions. 124, 601 (1956). REFERENCES 4. D. Iwanenko and A. Sokolow, Classical Field Theory, Moscow-Leningrad ( 1949). 1. L. Spitzer, Physics of Fully Ionized Gases, Interscience Publishers, Inc., New York (1956). 5. W. A. Newcomb, NYO-7887 (1954). 14