Departures from Local Thermodynamic Equilibrium

This paper starts with a definition of local thermodynamic equilibrium and points out the relationship between local and complete thermodynamic equilibrium. It is shown that electron collisions are essential for the establishment of LTE and a relationship is derived for the minimum electron density at which collision processes are just sufficiently frequent to cause the plasma to be in LTE in face of the competing radiative processes. This relationship is derived for an optically thin plasma. The effect of radiation trapping is considered and some figures given by which the effect of this can be taken into account in assessing the validity of LTE in such cases. Account is now taken of the finite time required for the atomic collision processes to establish the plasma in LTE. A numerical example is worked out which shows that these considerations can be very important for plasmas of rapidly varying temperature. Mention is also made of departures from LTE caused by inhomogeneities in the plasma and by the positive ions having a different kinetic temperature from the electrons. Finally, it is remarked that even if the criteria for LTE to be valid are not met then the Saha and Boltzmann equations may still be applied to describe the population densities of the upper levels of individual species of atoms or ions. (author)