English

Complexity and simplicity of plasmas

Plasma Physics 2014-03-05 v2

Abstract

This paper has two main parts. The first one presents a direct path from microscopic dynamics to Debye screening, Landau damping and collisional transport. It shows there is more simplicity in microscopic plasma physics than previously thought. The second part is more subjective. It describes some difficulties in facing plasma complexity in general, suggests an inquiry about the methods used empirically to tackle complex systems, discusses the teaching of plasma physics as a physics of complexity, and proposes new directions to face the inflation of information.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1303.4613,
  title  = {Complexity and simplicity of plasmas},
  author = {Dominique Escande},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1303.4613},
  year   = {2014}
}

Comments

13 pages

R2 v1 2026-06-21T23:44:27.791Z