Contents

• Introduction
  • Sources
  • What is Plasma?
  • Brief History of Plasma Physics
  • Basic Parameters
  • Plasma Frequency
  • Debye Shielding
  • Plasma Parameter
  • Collisions
  • Magnetized Plasmas
  • Plasma Beta
  
  
• Charged Particle Motion
  • Introduction
  • Motion in Uniform Fields
  • Method of Averaging
  • Guiding Centre Motion
  • Magnetic Drifts
  • Invariance of Magnetic Moment
  • Poincaré Invariants
  • Adiabatic Invariants
  • Magnetic Mirrors
  • Van Allen Radiation Belts
  • Ring Current
  • Second Adiabatic Invariant
  • Third Adiabatic Invariant
  • Motion in Oscillating Fields
  
  
• Plasma Fluid Theory
  • Introduction
  • Moments of the Distribution Function
  • Moments of the Collision Operator
  • Moments of the Kinetic Equation
  • Fluid Equations
  • Entropy Production
  • Fluid Closure
  • Braginskii Equations
  • Normalization of the Braginskii Equations
  • Cold-Plasma Equations
  • MHD Equations
  • Drift Equations
  • Closure in Collisionless Magnetized Plasmas
  • Langmuir Sheaths
  
  
• Waves in Cold Plasmas
  • Introduction
  • Plane Waves in a Homogeneous Plasma
  • Cold-Plasma Dielectric Permittivity
  • Cold-Plasma Dispersion Relation
  • Polarization
  • Cutoff and Resonance
  • Waves in an Unmagnetized Plasma
  • Low-Frequency Wave Propagation
  • Parallel Wave Propagation
  • Perpendicular Wave Propagation
  • Wave Propagation Through Inhomogeneous Plasmas
  • Cutoffs
  • Resonances
  • Resonant Layers
  • Collisional Damping
  • Pulse Propagation
  • Ray Tracing
  • Radio Wave Propagation Through the Ionosphere
  
  
• Magnetohydrodynamic Fluids
  • Introduction
  • Magnetic Pressure
  • Flux Freezing
  • MHD Waves
  • The Solar Wind
  • Parker Model of Solar Wind
  • Interplanetary Magnetic Field
  • Mass and Angular Momentum Loss
  • MHD Dynamo Theory
  • Homopolar Generators
  • Slow and Fast Dynamos
  • Cowling Anti-Dynamo Theorem
  • Ponomarenko Dynamos
  • Magnetic Reconnection
  • Linear Tearing Mode Theory
  • Nonlinear Tearing Mode Theory
  • Fast Magnetic Reconnection
  • MHD Shocks
  • Parallel Shocks
  • Perpendicular Shocks
  • Oblique Shocks
  
  
• Waves in Warm Plasmas
  • Introduction
  • Landau Damping
  • Physics of Landau Damping
  • Plasma Dispersion Function
  • Ion Sound Waves
  • Waves in Magnetized Plasmas
  • Parallel Wave Propagation
  • Perpendicular Wave Propagation