Relativistic Plasma in Supercritical Electromagnetic Fields

For plasmas in which the electromagnetic fields exceed a critical field strength, as defined by an invariant parameter in quantum electrodynamics, prolific production of high energy photons, electrons and positrons can cause complex new plasma interactions to occur. The physics of such plasmas in strong fields is critical to future high-intensity laser driven relativistic plasma physics, relativistic intense beam-beam interactions and is also relevant to early universe conditions, extreme astrophysical objects such as neutron star atmospheres and black hole environments. Papers for this Special Topic should relate to the physics of these environments.

Guest Editors: Alec Thomas and Stepan Bulanov