Effect of initial conditions on electron–plasma turbulence: a multiresolution analysis

Abstract

The transverse dynamics of a pure electron plasma confined in a Penning–Malmberg trap is investigated, taking advantage of two-dimensional particle-in-cell numerical simulations. The evolution of the electron plasma turbulence is studied by means of a wavelet-based multiresolution analysis. In particular, a modified recursive denoising algorithm is developed to separate coherent and incoherent (not necessarily homogeneous) components of the flow. A set of simulations have been carried out changing systematically the radii of an initial annular density distribution of the electrons. The results of the multiresolution analysis indicate that the initial density configuration may have a considerable effect on the evolution of turbulence. Even very small initial density fluctuations can lead to quite different final states, especially in the presence of multiple active diocotron modes characterized by similar growth rates.