Particle Simulations for Electron Beam-Plasma Interactions

The computer simulations of high-frequency instabilities excited by the high density electron beam and their nonlinear effect are presented. One-dimensional electromagnetic particle simulations are performed with different values of the electron beam-to-plasma density ratio. The results show that for the high electron beam-to-background plasma density ratio, all the Langmuir waves and two electromagnetic waves with left-hand and right-hand circular polarizations (i.e., the “L-O mode” and the “R-X mode”) propagating parallel to the magnetic field can be generated and the maximum values of wave electric fields are nearly the same. The electron beam and background plasma are diffused and a part of energetic background electrons are obviously accelerated by the wave-particle interactions. The heating of the beam and background plasma is mainly due to the electrostatic (Langmuir) wave-particle interactions, but the accelerations of a part of energetic background electrons may be mainly due to the electromagnetic wave-particle interactions.