Neutrino driven streaming instabilities in a dense plasma

The nonlinear self-consistent propagation of neutrinos in a dense plasma is described using the relativistic kinetic equations for neutrinos and elect rons. The general nonlinear dispersion relation for a. neutrino fluid coupl ed with a plasma is derived. For scenarios close to realistic astrophysical conditions, neutrino driven streaming instabilities can develop, with grow th rates which scale with the Fermi constant G(F), thus leading to signific ant energy transfer from the neutrinos to the plasma.