ABSTRACT
This chapter considers magnetic-field curvature effects in the kinetic and two-fluid instabilities. It shows that in the approximation of a rectilinear magnetic field and of zero Larmor radius, there takes place a splitting of low-frequency oscillation branches into inertial and inertialess branches. In this approximation the Alfven oscillation branches prove to be insensitive to resonant wave-particle interaction. The chapter discusses the transverse drift waves in the approximation of a rectilinear magnetic field. It shows that an analogous type of instability can take place even in the zero-ß plasma if the magnetic-field curvature is finite. The entropy waves in a curvilinear magnetic field are described by dispersion relation. The excitation of perturbations is related to the presence of the terms with Δ in dispersion relation, that is, to finite longitudinal electron heat conductivity. The chapter also considers the role of the curvature in the problem of instabilities in such plasmas.
