Electromagnetic electron wave
electromagnetic wave mode for propagation in a cold magnetoplasma
In plasma physics, an electromagnetic electron wave is a wave in a plasma which has a magnetic field component and in which primarily the electrons oscillate.
In an unmagnetized plasma, an electromagnetic electron wave is simply a light wave modified by the plasma. In a magnetized plasma, there are two modes perpendicular to the field, the O and X modes, and two modes parallel to the field, the R and L waves.
Waves in an unmagnetized plasma
Langmuir wave
The Langmuir wave is a purely longitudinal wave, that is, the wave vector is in the same direction as the electric field. It is an electrostatic wave; as such, it doesn't have an oscillating magnetic field.
A plasma consists of charged particles which react to electric fields, in contrast with dielectric matter. When electrons in a uniform, homogeneous plasma are perturbed from their equilibrium position, a charge separation occurs creating an electric field which acts as restoring force on the electrons. Since electrons have inertia the system behaves as a harmonic oscillator, where the electrons oscillate at a frequency ωpe, called electron plasma frequency. These oscillations do not propagate—the group velocity is 0.
When the thermal motion of the electrons is taken into account a shift in frequency from the electron plasma frequency ωpe occurs.
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This entry incorporates text from “Electromagnetic electron wave” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.