Ponderomotive force effects on slow-wave coupling

Abstract
Localized plasma density depressions are observed to form near a multi‐ring slow‐wave structure when the value of the nonlinearity parameter, s = ω2peEz2/8πω2nκT, is of order unity. Consequent changes in the wave propagation and coupling efficiency are reported. For large enough values of s, the coupling efficiency may be reduced by 50% from the linear value.