Origin of magnetic stochasticity and transport in plasma microturbulence

Phys Rev Lett. 2012 Jun 8;108(23):235002. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.108.235002. Epub 2012 Jun 6.

Abstract

Nonlinear excitation of linearly stable microtearing modes--with zonal modes acting as a catalyst--is shown to be responsible for the near-ubiquitous magnetic stochasticity and associated electromagnetic electron heat transport in electromagnetic gyrokinetic simulations of plasma microturbulence.