Collisional Delta-f Scheme with Evolving Background for Transport Time Scale Simulations
Authors: S. Brunner, E. Valeo, and J. Krommes
Date: July 9, 1999
Submitted: Physics of Plasmas, July 7, 1999
The delta-f approach is extended for simulating the transport time-scale evolution of near-Maxwellian distributions in collisional plasmas. This involves simultaneously advancing weighted marker particles for representing the intrinsically kinetic component delta-f, and fluid equations for the parameters of the shifted Maxwellian background fSM . The issue of increasing numerical noise in a collisional delta-f algorithm, due to marker particle weight spreading, is addressed in detail, and a solution to this problem is proposed. To obtain higher resolution in critical regions of phase space, a practical procedure for implementing sources and sinks of marker particles is developed. As a proof of principal, this set of methods are applied for computing electrical Spitzer conductivity as well as collisional absorption in a homogeneous plasma.