Molecular dynamics simulations of microfields in strongly correlated plasmas

We use molecular dynamics computer simulations to investigate the fluctuations of the electric microfield in a strongly coupled plasma. For a one-component plasma our results for the probability distribution bridge the gap between expressions obtained by cluster expansions valid for weakly coupled plasmas and those obtained in the simple harmonic oscillator model in the strong coupling regime. In a strongly coupled two-component plasma the dynamics does ceases to separate clearly into a fast electronic and a slow ionic component. Because of the formation of bound states the two-component autocorrelation functions for the electric field cannot be obtained by superposing the autocorrelation function of the electrons and ions. With increased coupling the conditional covariance of the microfield shows an increasing oscillatory behaviour as a function of time. This will influence the line shape of radiative transitions in the ions which is used as a tool for plasma diagnostics.