Exact results for thermodynamics of the hydrogen plasma: low-temperature expansions beyond Saha theory (Q2482271)

One considers a non-relativistic quantum hydrogen plasma made of protons and electrons, and the purpose of the paper is to derive low-density expansions for its pressure and free energy, in the referred to Saha regime, where a non-vanishing fraction of charges is recombined into hydrogen atoms. In the Saha regime, and at low temperature, the system look like an ideal mixture comprising hydrogen atoms, ionized protons and ionized electrons. The basic tool is the screened cluster expansion of particle densitites in terms of fugacities, which appears to be quite suitable to study recombined phases. After introducing the Saha regime and the screened cluster expansion, one obtains some estimations of ideal and non-ideal contributions to fugacity expansions of particle densities, and then one derives the scaled low-temperature expansions. The appendix displays the mathematics of some integrals involved in screened potential.. The reviewer does like the first sentence of the paper which reads, he quotes, hydrogen is an important element, both at a theoretical level and for practical purpose.