Growth of low-frequency waves due to a photon beam in a magnetized electron–positron plasma

Abstract

The effect of a beam of radio waves of very high brightness passing through a cold, magnetized, electron–positron plasma is discussed. The properties of the natural wave modes in such a plasma are summarized, and approximate forms for the nonlinear response tensor are written down. Photon-beam-induced instabilities of low-frequency waves in the pair plasma are analysed in the random-phase approximation. When three-wave interactions involve two high-frequency waves in the same mode and a low-frequency wave in a different mode, wave–wave interactions are similar to wave–particle interactions in that photons act like particles that emit and absorb low-frequency waves. The absorption coefficients for various low-frequency waves due to a photon beam are evaluated. In a pure electron–positron plasma, photon-beam-induced instabilities can be effective only when either the high-frequency or the low-frequency waves are strongly modified by the magnetic field. The growth of the low-frequency waves is most effective when the high-frequency photon beam has a frequency close to the cyclotron frequency.