# Journal of Plasma Physics Impact Factor & Information

Publisher: Cambridge University Press (CUP)

## Journal description

Journal of Plasma Physics publishes primary research articles in plasma physics both theoretical and experimental and its applications. Basic topics include the fundamental physics of plasmas ionization kinetic theory particle orbits stochastic dynamics wave propagation solitons stability shock waves transport heating and diagnostics. Applications include fusion laboratory plasmas and communications devices laser plasmas technological plasmas space physics and astrophysics.

## Impact Factor Rankings

2015 Impact Factor Available summer 2016 0.864 0.739 0.755 0.944 1.078 0.775 0.579 0.661 0.748 1.037 0.602 0.61 0.645 0.649 0.837 0.761 0.85 0.516 0.661 0.552 0.615 0.712 0.489

## Impact factor over time

Impact factor
.
Year

5-year impact 0.82 >10.0 0.26 0.00 0.33 Journal of Plasma Physics website Journal of plasma physics 0022-3778 1754745 Periodical, Internet resource Journal / Magazine / Newspaper, Internet Resource

## Publisher details

• Pre-print
• Author can archive a pre-print version
• Post-print
• Author can archive a post-print version
• Conditions
• Author's Pre-print on author's personal website, departmental website, social media websites, institutional repository, non-commercial subject-based repositories, such as PubMed Central, Europe PMC or arXiv
• Author's post-print on author's personal website on acceptance of publication
• Author's post-print on departmental website, institutional repository, non-commercial subject-based repositories, such as PubMed Central, Europe PMC or arXiv, after a 6 months embargo
• Publisher's version/PDF cannot be used
• Published abstract may be deposited
• Pre-print to record acceptance for publication
• Publisher copyright and source must be acknowledged with set statement
• Must link to publisher version
• Publisher last reviewed on 07/10/2014
• This policy is an exception to the default policies of 'Cambridge University Press (CUP)'
• Classification
​ green

## Publications in this journal

• ##### Article: Generalized self-similarity of intermittent plasma turbulence in space and laboratory plasmas
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ABSTRACT: Statistical characteristics of plasma fluctuations in the solar wind (SW), the Earth’s magnetosphere and fusion devices are reviewed. The turbulence in all these media has a complicated multiscale structure and exhibits a generalized self-similarity in an extended scale range. The anomalous transport of mass and momentum is intermittent and is carried by sporadic plasma flux bursts with non-Gaussian statistics, long-range correlation and multifractality. Intermittent turbulent transport is characterized by superdiffusion with power law $\langle {\it\delta}x^{2}\rangle \propto {\it\tau}^{{\it\alpha}}$ , ${\it\alpha}\approx 1.2{-}1.8$ . The structure functions in all these plasma environments are well fitted by the log-Poisson model of turbulence. Intermittent plasma turbulence displays universal properties and consists of quasi-1-D singular dissipative structures.
Journal of Plasma Physics 12/2015; 81(06). DOI:10.1017/S0022377815001099
• ##### Article: A tutorial introduction to the statistical theory of turbulent plasmas, a half-century after Kadomtsev’s Plasma Turbulence and the resonance-broadening theory of Dupree and Weinstock
John A. Krommes
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ABSTRACT: In honour of the 50th anniversary of the influential review/monograph on plasma turbulence by B. B. Kadomtsev as well as the seminal works of T. H. Dupree and J. Weinstock on resonance-broadening theory, an introductory tutorial is given about some highlights of the statistical–dynamical description of turbulent plasmas and fluids, including the ideas of nonlinear incoherent noise, coherent damping, and self-consistent dielectric response. The statistical closure problem is introduced. Incoherent noise and coherent damping are illustrated with a solvable model of passive advection. Self-consistency introduces turbulent polarization effects that are described by the dielectric function ${\mathcal{D}}$ . Dupree’s method of using ${\mathcal{D}}$ to estimate the saturation level of turbulence is described; then it is explained why a more complete theory that includes nonlinear noise is required. The general theory is best formulated in terms of Dyson equations for the covariance $C$ and an infinitesimal response function $R$ , which subsumes ${\mathcal{D}}$ . An important example is the direct-interaction approximation (DIA). It is shown how to use Novikov’s theorem to develop an $\boldsymbol{x}$ -space approach to the DIA that is complementary to the original $\boldsymbol{k}$ -space approach of Kraichnan. A dielectric function is defined for arbitrary quadratically nonlinear systems, including the Navier–Stokes equation, and an algorithm for determining the form of ${\mathcal{D}}$ in the DIA is sketched. The independent insights of Kadomtsev and Kraichnan about the problem of the DIA with random Galilean invariance are described. The mixing-length formula for drift-wave saturation is discussed in the context of closures that include nonlinear noise (shielded by ${\mathcal{D}}$ ). The role of $R$ in the calculation of the symmetry-breaking (zonostrophic) instability of homogeneous turbulence to the generation of inhomogeneous mean flows is addressed. The second-order cumulant expansion and the stochastic structural stability theory are also discussed in that context. Various historical research threads are mentioned and representative entry points to the literature are given. Some outstanding conceptual issues are enumerated.
Journal of Plasma Physics 12/2015; 81(06). DOI:10.1017/S0022377815000756
• ##### Article: Effect of the laser intensity profile on the shock non-uniformity in a directly driven spherical target
Mauro Temporal · Benoit Canaud · Warren J. Garbett · Rafael Ramis
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ABSTRACT: An axially symmetric laser beam configuration irradiating a spherical capsule has been considered in the context of inertial confinement fusion (ICF). The laser beams are located at co-latitudes 49° and 131° and mimic the quad positions in the second cone of the Laser Mégajoule Facility. The capsule is directly irradiated by the laser beams whose energy deposition generates a nearly spherical shock wave. Two-dimensional hydrodynamic numerical simulations have been performed to analyse the non-uniformity of the shock wavefront launched inward throughout the target. Different laser intensity profiles, calculated by the illumination model, have been tested. The performance, in terms of shock non-uniformity, has been compared, and it is found that with an appropriate choice of the laser intensity profile it is possible to control the shock non-uniformity at early times.
Journal of Plasma Physics 10/2015; 81(05). DOI:10.1017/S0022377815000938
• ##### Article: Turbulent convective flows in the solar photospheric plasma
A. Caroli · F. Giannattasio · M. Fanfoni · D. Del Moro · G. Consolini · F. Berrilli
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ABSTRACT: The origin of the 22-year solar magnetic cycle lies below the photosphere where multiscale plasma motions, due to turbulent convection, produce magnetic fields. The most powerful intensity and velocity signals are associated with convection cells, called granules, with a scale of typically 1 Mm and a lifetime of a few minutes. Small-scale magnetic elements (SMEs), ubiquitous on the solar photosphere, are passively transported by associated plasma flows. This advection makes their traces very suitable for defining the convective regime of the photosphere. Therefore the solar photosphere offers an exceptional opportunity to investigate convective motions, associated with compressible, stratified, magnetic, rotating and large Rayleigh number stellar plasmas. The magnetograms used here come from a Hinode/SOT uninterrupted 25-hour sequence of spectropolarimetric images. The mean-square displacement of SMEs has been modelled with a power law with spectral index ${\it\gamma}$ . We found ${\it\gamma}=1.34\pm 0.02$ for times up to ${\sim}2000~\text{s}$ and ${\it\gamma}=1.20\pm 0.05$ for times up to ${\sim}10\,000~\text{s}$ . An alternative way to investigate the advective–diffusive motion of SMEs is to look at the evolution of the two-dimensional probability distribution function (PDF) for the displacements. Although at very short time scales the PDFs are affected by pixel resolution, for times shorter than ${\sim}2000~\text{s}$ the PDFs seem to broaden symmetrically with time. In contrast, at longer times a multi-peaked feature of the PDFs emerges, which suggests the non-trivial nature of the diffusion–advection process of magnetic elements. A Voronoi distribution analysis shows that the observed small-scale distribution of SMEs involves the complex details of highly nonlinear small-scale interactions of turbulent convective flows detected in solar photospheric plasma.
Journal of Plasma Physics 10/2015; 81(05). DOI:10.1017/S0022377815000872
• ##### Article: X-ray free-electron laser studies of dense plasmas
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ABSTRACT: The high peak brightness of X-ray free-electron lasers (FELs), coupled with X-ray optics enabling the focusing of pulses down to sub-micron spot sizes, provides an attractive route to generating high energy-density systems on femtosecond time scales, via the isochoric heating of solid samples. Once created, the fundamental properties of these plasmas can be studied with unprecedented accuracy and control, providing essential experimental data needed to test and benchmark commonly used theoretical models and assumptions in the study of matter in extreme conditions, as well as to develop new predictive capabilities. Current advances in isochoric heating and spectroscopic plasma studies on X-ray FELs are reviewed and future research directions and opportunities discussed.
Journal of Plasma Physics 10/2015; 81(05). DOI:10.1017/S0022377815000902
• ##### Article: Suppression of runaway electron generation by massive helium injection after induced disruptions on TEXTOR
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ABSTRACT: Disruptions with runaway electron generation have been deliberately induced by injection of argon using a disruption mitigation valve. A second disruption mitigation valve has been utilised to inject varying amounts of helium after a short time delay. No generation of runaway electrons has been observed when more than a critical amount of helium has been injected no later than 5 ms after the triggering of the first valve. The required amount of helium for suppression of runaway electron generation is up to one order of magnitude lower than the critical density according to Connor & Hastie (1975) and Rosenbluth & Putvinski (1997).
Journal of Plasma Physics 10/2015; 81(05):475810507. DOI:10.1017/S0022377815001051
• ##### Article: A super-cusp divertor configuration for tokamaks
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ABSTRACT: This study demonstrates a remarkable flexibility of advanced divertor configurations created with the remote poloidal field coils. The emphasis here is on the configurations with three poloidal field nulls in the divertor area. We are seeking the structures where all three nulls lie on the same separatrix, thereby creating two zones of a very strong flux expansion, as envisaged in the concept of Takase’s cusp divertor. It turns out that the set of remote coils can indeed produce a cusp divertor, with additional advantages of: (i) a large stand-off distance between the divertor and the coils and (ii) a thorough control that these coils exert over the fine features of the configuration. In reference to these additional favourable properties acquired by the cusp divertor, the resulting configuration could be called ‘a super-cusp’. General geometrical features of the three-null configurations produced by remote coils are described. Issues on the way to practical applications include the need for a more sophisticated control system and possible constraints related to excessively high currents in the divertor coils.
Journal of Plasma Physics 10/2015; 81(05). DOI:10.1017/S0022377815001026
• ##### Article: Soliton-like solutions and chaotic motions for a forced and damped Zakharov–Kuznetsov equation in a magnetized electron–positron–ion plasma
Hui-Ling Zhen · Bo Tian · De-Yin Liu · Lei Liu · Yan Jiang
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ABSTRACT: A forced and damped Zakharov–Kuznetsov equation for a magnetized electron–positron–ion plasma affected by an external force is studied in this paper. Via the Hirota method, the soliton-like solutions are given. The soliton’s amplitude gets enhanced with the phase velocity ${\it\lambda}$ decreasing or ion-to-electron density ratio ${\it\beta}$ increasing. With the damped coefficient increasing, when the external force $g(t)$ is periodic, the two solitons are always parallel during the propagation and background of the two solitons drops on the $x{-}y$ plane, and amplitudes of the two solitons increase on the $x{-}t$ and $y{-}t$ planes, with $(x,y)$ as the coordinates of the propagation plane and $t$ as the time. When $g(t)$ is exponentially decreasing, the two solitons merge into a single one and the background rises on the $x{-}y$ plane, and amplitudes of the two solitons decrease on the $x{-}t$ and $y{-}t$ planes. Further, associated chaotic motions are obtained when $g(t)$ is periodic. Using the phase projections and Poincaré sections, we find that the chaotic motions can be weakened with ${\it\alpha}_{1}$ , the amplitude of $g(t)$ , decreasing. With ${\it\alpha}_{2}$ , the frequency of $g(t)$ , decreasing, a three-dimensional attractor with stretching-and-folding structure is found, indicating that the weak chaos is transformed into the developed chaos. Chaotic motions can also be weakened with ${\it\lambda}$ , the phase velocity, decreasing, but strengthened with ${\it\beta}$ , the ion-to-electron density ratio, and ${\it\alpha}_{2}$ decreasing.
Journal of Plasma Physics 10/2015; 81(05). DOI:10.1017/S0022377815000884
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##### Article: Immersed boundary methods for numerical simulation of confined fluid and plasma turbulence in complex geometries: a review
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ABSTRACT: Immersed boundary methods for computing confined fluid and plasma flows in complex geometries are reviewed. The mathematical principle of the volume penalization technique is described and simple examples for imposing Dirichlet and Neumann boundary conditions in one dimension are given. Applications for fluid and plasma turbulence in two and three space dimensions illustrate the applicability and the efficiency of the method in computing flows in complex geometries, for example in toroidal geometries with asymmetric poloidal cross-sections.
Journal of Plasma Physics 08/2015; 81(06). DOI:10.1017/S0022377815000598
• ##### Article: Toroidal equilibrium states with reversed magnetic shear and parallel flow in connection with the formation of Internal Transport Barriers
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ABSTRACT: We construct nonlinear toroidal equilibria of fixed diverted boundary shaping with reversed magnetic shear and flows parallel to the magnetic field. The equilibria have hole-like current density and the reversed magnetic shear increases as the equilibrium nonlinearity becomes stronger. Also, application of a sufficient condition for linear stability implies that the stability is improved as the equilibrium nonlinearity correlated to the reversed magnetic shear gets stronger with a weaker stabilizing contribution from the flow. These results indicate synergetic stabilizing effects of reversed magnetic shear, equilibrium nonlinearity and flow in the establishment of Internal Transport Barriers (ITBs).
Journal of Plasma Physics 08/2015; 81(04):1-14. DOI:10.1017/S0022377815000343
• ##### Article: Maser gain determined by the spatial profile of work done by an average electron and the wavelength of density fluctuation driven by the maser field in multi-photon free-electron two-quantum Stark radiation
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ABSTRACT: We find that the electron in an electron–cyclotron maser (ECM) of Nc = n1/3λ ≫ 1, where n and λ are the electron density and the maser wavelength, respectively, can only lower its energy through masing transition. From this fact and the application of Heisenberg's uncertainty principle on photon emission, we infer that until the electron energy becomes lower to pass through the width of uncertainty in the electron energy, the interval time Tint between two successive radiative transitions is zero. Hence, we find that if the number Nt of radiative transitions during the laser period T under the assumption of Tint = 0 is far larger than the number Nu of radiative transitions required to pass through the half-width ΔE of uncertainty in the electron energy, the radiation power from an electron is equal to ΔE/T. We deduce that the shift in the energy level of an average electron is predominantly produced by the density-deviation mode driven by the laser field so as to be spatially sinusoidal with period λw and amplitude \$\mathcal W\$. We recognize that the uncertainty in the z position of an electron emitting a laser photon through free-electron two-quantum Stark (FETQS) radiation is the wavelength λe of the electric wiggler. Thus, if λw ≪ λe, then ΔE is equal to \$\mathcal W\$. Based on the above findings, we identify electron–cyclotron masing in a high-density ECM as a gyration-driven FETQS radiation whose power is given by P = ΔE/T, where ΔE is not caused by gyration but rotation around the waveguide axis. The gain calculated based on this identification agrees with the measured one.
Journal of Plasma Physics 08/2015; 81(04):1-16. DOI:10.1017/S0022377815000367
• ##### Article: Experimental observation of hot tail runaway electron generation in TEXTOR disruptions
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ABSTRACT: Experimental evidence supporting the theory of hot tail runaway electron (RE) generation has been identified in TEXTOR disruptions. With higher temperature, more REs are generated during the thermal quench. Increasing the RE generation by increasing the temperature, an obvious RE plateau is observed even with low toroidal magnetic field (1.7 T). These results explain the previously found electron density threshold for RE generation.
Journal of Plasma Physics 08/2015; 81(04):1-10. DOI:10.1017/S0022377815000380
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##### Article: Special issue: Macroscopic randomness in astrophysical plasmas: The legacy and vision of Ya. B. Zeldovich
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ABSTRACT: This issue commemorates an outstanding scientist of the twentieth century, Yakov Borisovich Zeldovich, in connection with the centenary of his birth (8 March 1914), with a collection of reviews and research articles broadly related to large-scale random phenomena in astrophysical plasmas.
Journal of Plasma Physics 08/2015; 81(04):1-3. DOI:10.1017/S0022377815000355
• ##### Article: Ball lightning with the nonrelativistic electrons of the core
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ABSTRACT: The lifetimes, volume densities of energy, electron and ion densities and other parameters of ball lightning cores with the nonrelativistic electrons are estimated. The model according to which the motion of the electrons of the ball lightning core is the superposition of the oscillatory motion and the thermal motion in the directions perpendicular to those of the oscillations is proposed. Some problems related to isolation of the ball lightning core from the atmosphere and the transfer of the atmospheric pressure on it are considered.
Journal of Plasma Physics 08/2015; 81(04):1-18. DOI:10.1017/S0022377815000410
• ##### Article: Intermittency and random matrices
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ABSTRACT: A spectacular phenomenon of intermittency, i.e. a progressive growth of higher statistical moments of a physical field excited by an instability in a random medium, attracted the attention of Zeldovich in the last years of his life. At that time, the mathematical aspects underlying the physical description of this phenomenon were still under development and relations between various findings in the field remained obscure. Contemporary results from the theory of the product of independent random matrices (the Furstenberg theory) allowed the elaboration of the phenomenon of intermittency in a systematic way. We consider applications of the Furstenberg theory to some problems in cosmology and dynamo theory.
Journal of Plasma Physics 08/2015; 81(04):1-13. DOI:10.1017/S0022377815000458
• ##### Article: Cold atmospheric plasma activity on microorganisms. A study on the influence of the treatment time and surface
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ABSTRACT: The second half of the 20th century can be characterized and named as the ‘plasma era’, as the plasma gathered scientific interest because of its special physical behaviour. Thus, it was considered as the fourth material state and the plasma physics began to form consequently. In addition to this, many important applications of plasma were discovered and put to use. Especially, in last few decades, there has been an increased interest in the use of cold atmospheric plasma in bio-chemical applications. Until now, thermal plasma has been commonly used in many bio-medical and other applications; however, more recent efforts have shown that plasma can also be produced at lower temperature (close to the environment temperature) by using ambient air in an open space (in atmospheric pressure). However, two aspects remain neglected: firstly, low-temperature plasma production with a large area, and secondly, acquiring the necessary knowledge and understanding the relevant interaction mechanisms of plasma species with microorganisms. These aspects are currently being investigated at the ‘Demokritos’ Plasma Laboratory in Athens, Greece with radio frequency (27.12 MHz and it integer harmonics)-driven sub-atmospheric pressure plasma (100 Pa). The first aspect was achieved with atmospheric plasma being produced at a low temperature (close to the environment temperature) and in a large closed space systems. Regarding the plasma effect on living microorganisms, preliminary experiments and findings have already been carried out and many more have been planned for the near future.
Journal of Plasma Physics 08/2015; 81(04):1-14. DOI:10.1017/S002237781500032X