Plasma Physics in Active Wave Ionosphere Interaction

One essential feature of plasma media is supporting various plasma waves and dictating electromagnetic wave propagation. This textbook provides students with an understanding of plasma waves, which is key to theoretical and experimental plasma research and understanding the experimental results, and will enable them to expand their studies into related areas.

The first part of the text provides the basis of plasma modes, including the formulations, analyses and the physical characterizations. The second part introduces techniques for the studies of wave propagation in inhomogeneous plasma and of nonlinear mode–mode coupling in turbulent plasma as well as in active plasma, applied to exemplify the excitation of parametric instabilities in high-frequency (HF) wave heated ionospheric plasma. The third part introduces nonlinear plasma waves of periodic function forms and of solitary forms; a potential application of the HF wave–ionosphere interaction for setting up an ionospheric very-low-frequency transmitter for underwater communications is introduced.

This is also a useful reference book for researchers in the areas of plasma physics and engineering, and in geophysics.

Contents:

• Basis of Plasma
• Electromagnetic Property of Plasma and Plasma Modes
• Kinetic-Derivation and Analysis of the Dielectric Tensor
• Electromagnetic Wave Propagation in the Ionosphere
• Electromagnetic Wave Interaction with the Ionosphere
• Parametric Instabilities
• Parametric Instabilities Excited in High-Frequency Heating Experiments
• Nonlinear Plasma Waves
• Ionospheric Very-Low-Frequency Transmitter

Readership: Student and professional for all levels in plasma physics.
Key Features:

• Theories are connected to the represented (HF heating) experiments, which enables readers to grasp and appreciate the study
• HF heating experiments are active research area, this book provides theoretical basis for the understanding of the experimental observations and for preparing future experiments
• Home-work problems include not only physics questions, but also engineering questions which have practical applications and are attractive to engineers as well