Relativistic electromagnetic flat top solitons and their stability

The inclusion of ion response in the study of relativistically intense electromagnetic laser pulse propagation in plasma yields certain distinct varieties of single peak solitonic structures. A flat top slow moving structure (for which the various fields have a flat profile over a wide spatial range) is one such solution. A detailed characterization of these solutions along with the eigen spectrum of their formation in the parameter space has been presented. The evolution of this particular solution is studied in detail with the help of a coupled fluid Maxwell set of equations. The study shows that the flat top solution is unstable. The instability is characterized as the backward Brillouin instability for which the electron quiver velocity plays the role of the effective temperature. (C) 2011 American Institute of Physics. [doi:10.1063/1.3662441]