Phys.org July 13, 2021
Researchers at Princeton University systematically mapped out all the topological phases of cold magnetized plasmas and established the bulk-edge correspondence. They found that for the linear eigenmodes, there are 10 topological phases in the parameter space of density n, magnetic field B, and parallel wavenumber kz, separated by the surfaces of Langmuir wave-L wave resonance, Langmuir wave-cyclotron wave resonance, and zero magnetic field. For fixed B and kz, only the phase transition at the Langmuir wave-cyclotron wave resonance corresponds to edge modes. A sufficient and necessary condition for the existence of this type of edge modes is given and verified by numerical solutions. They demonstrated that edge modes exist not only on a plasma-vacuum interface but also on more general plasma-plasma interfaces. This finding could lead to advances in harvesting on Earth the fusion energy that powers the sun and stars…read more. Open Access TECHNICAL ARTICLEÂ
Topological phase diagrams of magnetized cold plasma. Credit: Nature Communications volume 12, Article number: 3924 (2021)