Chaoticity threshold in magnetized plasmas: Numerical results in the weak coupling regime

The present paper is a numerical counterpart to the theoretical work [Carati et al., Chaos 22, 033124 (2012)]. We are concerned with the transition from order to chaos in a one-component plasma (a system of point electrons with mutual Coulomb interactions, in a uniform neutralizing background), the plasma being immersed in a uniform stationary magnetic field. In the paper [Carati et al., Chaos 22, 033124 (2012)], it was predicted that a transition should take place when the electron density is increased or the field decreased in such a way that the ratio ωp/ωc between plasma and cyclotron frequencies becomes of order 1, irrespective of the value of the so-called Coulomb coupling parameter Γ. Here, we perform numerical computations for a first principles model of N point electrons in a periodic box, with mutual Coulomb interactions, using as a probe for chaoticity the time-autocorrelation function of magnetization. We consider two values of Γ (0.04 and 0.016) in the weak coupling regime Γ ≪ 1, with N up to 512. A transition is found to occur for ωp/ωc in the range between 0.25 and 2, in fairly good agreement with the theoretical prediction. These results might be of interest for the problem of the breakdown of plasma confinement in fusion machines.