Pair Correlation in a Plasma

Abstract

A technique due to Dupree is used to investigate the pair correlation function in a dilute, uniform, quiescent plasma. It is demonstrated that his formal expression for the pair function may be evaluated in many cases of physical interest. In equilibrium one obtains the usual Debye‐Hückel result, which may be generalized to the case of a plasma having different temperatures in different directions. A Lorentzian‐type velocity distribution gives rise to a correlation function containing less than unit screening charge. It is shown that such behavior is only to be expected for velocity distributions that approach zero rather slowly in the limit of large velocity. Finally, a Druyvesteyn‐type distribution is investigated and shown to lead to a pair function that falls off somewhat more slowly, and has a different form, from that of the Debye‐Hückel theory.