Energy transfer and potential energy contributions in dense two-temperature plasmas

We investigate the relaxation of nonideal plasmas and demonstrate the connection between the energy transfer rate and potential energy contributions. A quantum-statistical approach is used to determine how the energies of the electron and ion subsystems can be defined. In particular, it is shown that the electron–ion potential energy term must be split equally between both subsystems. We finally demonstrate that this treatment is consistent with the transfer of total energy between the subsystems as it is for instance considered within the coupled mode approach.