Relaxation of Coaxial Nonneutral Magnetized Plasmas

Abstract

A variational principle is applied to the relaxation of pure electron plasma in a strong axial magnetic field. The initial cylindrical shell structure of electrons can be unstable against Kelvin Helmholtz instability, and the plasma shape relaxes to its final state having a diffused profile. The shape of the plasma distribution in the final state is given based upon the anzats of the minimum enstrophy, and an experimentally-testable formula is obtained.