Theoretical and numerical study of the equations of Vlasov-Maxwell in the covariant formalism

A new point of view is proposed for the simulation of plasmas using the kinetic model which links the equations of Vlasov for the distribution of particles and the equations of Maxwell for the electromagnetic contribution of fields. We use the following principle: the equations of Physics are mathematical objects which put in relation geometrical objects. To preserve the geometrical properties of the various objects in an equation, we use, for the theoretical and numerical study, the differential geometry. All the equations of Physics can be written with differential forms and this point of view is not dependent on the choice of coordinates. We propose then a discretization of the differential forms by using B-Splines. To be coherent with the theory, we also propose a discretization of the various operations of the differential geometry. We test our scheme, first on the equations of Maxwell with several boundary conditions and since it does not depend on the system of coordinates, we also test it when we change coordinates. Finally, we apply the same method to the equations of Vlasov-Poisson in one-dimension and we propose several numerical schemes. (author)