Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Weibel Instability And Associated Strong Fields In A Fully 3d Simulation Of A Relativistic Shock, K.-I. Nishikawa, J. Niemiec, P. E. Hardee, M. Medvedev, H. Sol, Y. Mizuno, B. Zhang, M. Pohl, M. Oka, Dieter H. Hartmann

Publications

Plasma instabilities (e.g., Buneman, Weibel and other two-stream instabilities) excited in collision-less shocks are responsible for particle (electron, positron, and ion) acceleration. Using a new 3-D relativistic particle-in-cell code, we have investigated the particle acceleration and shock structure associated with an unmagnetized relativistic electron-positron jet propagating into an unmagnetized electron-positron plasma. The simulation has been performed using a long simulation system in order to study the nonlinear stages of the Weibel instability, the particle acceleration mechanism, and the shock structure. Cold jet electrons are thermalized and slowed while the ambient electrons are swept up to create a partially developed hydrodynamic …