Non-Maxwellianity in Temperature Relaxation between Plasma Species
Abstract
Temperature relaxation between plasma species is usually described by Landau--Spitzer (LS) theory, which assumes Maxwellian distributions throughout. We show analytically that, for two Maxwellian species in homogeneous isotropic plasmas, the interspecies collisions driving relaxation generate a universal three-lobe initial distortion and that these distortions initially reduce energy exchange over a broad parameter range. Full Fokker--Planck simulations reveal substantial relaxation delays when interspecies deformation competes with self-thermalization. For post-shock deuterium--tritium plasmas relevant to inertial confinement fusion, with TT/TD=1.5, the relaxation time exceeds the LS prediction by 47%. The accompanying distortions lower the apparent DD/DT temperature ratio and produce positive DD and negative DT Gamow-shift residuals relative to Maxwellian predictions. These results also motivate examining non-Maxwellianity in fuel heating by fusion α particles.
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BibTeX
@misc{guo2026nonmaxwellianity,
title = {{Non-Maxwellianity in Temperature Relaxation between Plasma Species}},
author = {Yao Guo and Dong Wu and Jie Zhang},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2610.35009},
eprint = {2610.35009},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.35009},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Non-Maxwellianity in Temperature Relaxation between Plasma Species
AU - Yao Guo
AU - Dong Wu
AU - Jie Zhang
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/26
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2610.35009
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.35009
AB - Temperature relaxation between plasma species is usually described by Landau--Spitzer (LS) theory, which assumes Maxwellian distributions throughout. We show analytically that, for two Maxwellian species in homogeneous isotropic plasmas, the interspecies collisions driving relaxation generate a universal three-lobe initial distortion and that these distortions initially reduce energy exchange over a broad parameter range. Full Fokker--Planck simulations reveal substantial relaxation delays when interspecies deformation competes with self-thermalization. For post-shock deuterium--tritium plasmas relevant to inertial confinement fusion, with T_T/T_D=1.5, the relaxation time exceeds the LS prediction by 47%. The accompanying distortions lower the apparent DD/DT temperature ratio and produce positive DD and negative DT Gamow-shift residuals relative to Maxwellian predictions. These results also motivate examining non-Maxwellianity in fuel heating by fusion α particles.
ER -