Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 April 2001
A new mechanism for the formation of pinching plasma instability related to a tangential discontinuity is discussed. With this in mind we use a simple model of the Davydov–Zakharov class. It appears that there is a strong dependence of the instability increment on current density, resulting from the corresponding dispersion relation. Modulation of a current pulse is shown to be a possible way of stabilizing powerful discharges.