Influence of atomic kinetics on inverse Bremsstrahlung heating and non-local thermal transport

Abstract

This paper describes a computational model that self-consistently combines physics of kinetic electrons and atomic processes in a single framework. The formulation consists of a kinetic Vlasov- Boltzmann-Fokker-Planck equation for free electrons and a non-Maxwellian collisional-radiative model for atomic state populations. We utilize this model to examine the influence of atomic kinetics on inverse Bremsstrahlung (IB) heating and non-local thermal transport. We show that atomic kinetics affects non-linear IB absorption rates by further modifying the electron distribution in addition to laser heating. We also show that accurate modeling of non-local heat flow requires a self-consistent treatment of atomic kinetics, because the effective thermal conductivity strongly depends on the ionization balance of the plasma.