Effect of external fields on pattern formation of charged grains in plasma

Abstract

Two‐dimensional cluster and pattern formation by charged grains in plasma under external harmonic force and transverse magnetic field is investigated using molecular dynamics simulation. It is found that, as a result of the Yukawa‐like grain‐grain interaction and the external fields, the asymptotic quasistationary state of an initially homogeneous and Maxwellian velocity distributed grain system can be a disk cluster with the grain trajectories having flowery zonal patterns.