A Mathematical Formalism for Plasma Equilibria in Arbitrary Geometries

摘要

The report is intended to be the forerunner of a series of papers presenting a rather general treatment of microinstabilities in low-beta plasmas. Section 1 gives some remarks on the current situation in microinstability research, while Sec. 2 deals with plasma equilibria, starting from the Vlasov equation. In the course of extending a method devised by J. B. Taylor and R. J. Hastie, a mathematical formalism is presented which considerably simplifies the involved calculations required by the theory. In a first practical application this formalism is used for calculating the zero and first order equilibrium distribution functions in a very concise manner. (Author)