Drift solitary structures in inhomogeneous degenerate quantum plasmas with trapped electrons

• Published in: Astrophysics and space science Vol. 350; no. 2; pp. 615 - 622
• Main Authors: Shah, H. A., Masood, W., Asim, M. T., Qureshi, M. N. S.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Dordrecht Springer Netherlands 01.04.2014; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Astrobiology; Astronomy; Astrophysics; Astrophysics and Astroparticles; Cosmology; Electrons; Observations and Techniques; Original Article; Physics; Physics and Astronomy; Plasma; Quantum physics; Space Exploration and Astronautics; Space Sciences (including Extraterrestrial Physics; Velocity; Solitary structure; Trapped electron; Drift wave
• ISSN: 0004-640X; 1572-946X
• DOI: 10.1007/s10509-014-1802-5

In the present work, we have considered the nonlinear effects due to trapped electrons in an inhomogeneous degenerate quantum plasma. The formation of drift solitary structures has been investigated for both fully and partially degenerate plasmas. The Sagdeev potential approach has been employed to obtain arbitrary amplitude solitary structures. Interestingly, for a fixed value of density, not only compressive but rarefactive solitary structures have been obtained for a certain temperature range. Furthermore, it has been observed that the drift solitary structures exist only for the case when the drift velocity is smaller than the velocity of the nonlinear structure. The theoretical results obtained have been analyzed numerically for the parameters typically found in white dwarfs and the relevance of the results with regard to white dwarf asteroseismology is also pointed out.