Demonstration of metaplectic geometrical optics for reduced modeling of plasma waves

Rune Højlund Marholt*, Mads Givskov Senstius, Stefan Kragh Nielsen

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalJournal articleResearchpeer-review

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Abstract

The Wentzel, Kramers, and Brillouin (WKB) approximation of geometrical optics is widely used in plasma physics, quantum mechanics, and reduced wave modeling, in general. However, it is well-known that the approximation breaks down at focal and turning points. In this paper, we present an unsupervised numerical implementation of the recently developed metaplectic geometrical optics framework, which extends the applicability of geometrical optics beyond the limitations of WKB, such that the wave field remains finite at caustics. The implementation is in 1D and uses a combination of Gauss-Freud quadrature and barycentric rational function inter- and extrapolation to perform an inverse metaplectic transform numerically. The capabilities of the numerical implementation are demonstrated on Airy's and Weber's equations, which both have exact solutions to compare with. Finally, the implementation is applied to the plasma physics problem of linear conversion of X mode to electron Bernstein waves at the upper hybrid layer and a comparison is made with results from fully kinetic particle-in-cell simulations. In all three applications, we find good agreement between the exact results and a reduced wave modeling paradigm of metaplectic geometrical optics.

Original languageEnglish
Article number025208
JournalPhysical Review E
Volume110
Issue number2
Number of pages16
ISSN2470-0045
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2024

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