Dynamics of an atmospheric pressure plasma plume generated by submicrosecond voltage pulses

✍ Scribed by Lu, XinPei; Laroussi, Mounir

• Book ID: 111654877
• Publisher: American Institute of Physics
• Year: 2006
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 598 KB
• Volume: 100
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0021-8979
• DOI: 10.1063/1.2349475

✦ Synopsis

Nonequilibrium plasmas driven by submicrosecond high voltage pulses have been proven to produce high-energy electrons, which in turn lead to enhanced ionization and excitations. Here, we describe a device capable of launching a cold plasma plume in the surrounding air. This device, “the plasma pencil,” is driven by few hundred nanosecond wide pulses at repetition rates of a few kilohertz. Correlation between current-voltage characteristics and fast photography shows that the plasma plume is in fact a small bulletlike volume of plasma traveling at unusually high velocities. A model based on photoionization is used to explain the propagation kinetics of the plasma bullet under low electric field conditions.