Turbulence and particle energization in strongly magnetized pair plasmas*

Plasma turbulence is ubiquitous in astrophysical systems. In some applications, plasma may be relativistically hot. We present phenomenological and numerical studies of Alfvenic turbulence in a collisionless, relativistic pair plasma with an imposed large-scale magnetic field. We consider the regime when the equation of state is relativistic while the plasma fluctuations are mildly relativistic. We discuss the spectra of turbulence and intermittency effects. In collisionless plasmas, particles that interact with turbulent fluctuations do not fully relax to a thermal distribution and end up forming non-Maxwellian tails. We perform particle-in-cell simulations of relativistic decaying turbulence in a pair plasma to study particle energization. We discuss the turbulent cascade and the global particle energy distribution functions.