Thomson Scattering Forward Model for Non-Maxwellian Plasmas

Thomson scattering spectral fitting routines typically assume Maxwellian plasmas. There are many cases where ionospheric and laboratory plasmas have non-Maxwellian distributions. We develop a novel method to calculate the Thomson scattering forward model for an arbitrary non-Maxwellian distribution function. Our method is found to be more computationally efficient and accurate compared to previous methods. Furthermore, it has generality for use in a broad range of kinetic plasma theory problems. We provide example calculations for a Maxwellian distribution showing that all features of the spectra are captured. We apply this method to a highly non-Maxwellian toroidal ion distribution function typically found in high latitude frictionally heated ionospheric plasmas.