Ion acoustic waves in generalized electron distributed unmagnetized plasmas

Ion-acoustic shock waves are studied in an unmagnetized plasma consisting of Cairns-Tsallis distributed electrons and cold ions. The dissipa- tion is introduced in the system via kinematic viscosity. Using standard reductive perturbation method two nonlinear equations namely Korteweg - deVries Burgers (KdV-B) and Burgers are derived by using two different sets of stretched variables and the solutions are obtained using the tangent hyperbolic method. It is found that the nonthermal and the nonextensive parameters have opposite effect on the phase velocity of the wave. Further, kinematic viscosity, nonthermality and nonextensivity significantly affect the transition from solitary wave to shock wave. The system under consideration admits rarefactive shock structures. Nonthermal effect enhances the amplitude of the shock potential while the nonextensive parameter reduces it. The kinematic viscosity also reduces the steepening of the shock wave but the amplitude remains unchanged. The analysis presented in this manuscript could be useful for explaining the basic features of ion-acoustic shock waves in magnetospheric plasma which contains an excess of nonthermal particles.