Characteristic plume morphologies of atmospheric Ar and He plasma jets excited by a pulsed microwave hairpin resonator

Different discharge morphologies in atmospheric Ar and He plasmas are excited by using a pulsed microwave hairpin resonator.Ar plasmas form an arched plasma plume at the opened end of the hairpin,whereas He plumes generate only a contracted plasmas in between both tips of metal electrodes.Despite this different point,their discharge processes have three similar characteristics:(i)the ionization occurs at the main electrode firstly and then develops to the slave electrode,(ii)during the shrinking stage the middle domain of the discharge channels disappears at last,and(iii)even at zero power input(in between pulses)a weak light region always exists in the discharge channels.Both experimental results and electromagnetic simulations suggest that the discharge is resonantly excited by the local enhanced electric fields.In addition,Ar ionization and excitation energies are lower than those of He,the effect of Ar gas flow is far greater than that of He gas,and the contribution of accelerated electrons only locates at the domain with the strongest electric fields.These reasons could be used to interpret the different characteristic plume morphologies of the proposed atmospheric Ar and He plasmas.

Rate constants for the reaction of hydroxyl radicals with HFC-134a

Rate constants for the reaction of hydroxyl radicals with HFC 134a (CH 2FCF 3) have been measured by the discharge flow resonance fluorescence (DF RF) technique over the temperature range 288—370 K. The derived Arrhenius equation is: k″ =(1.27±0.16)×10 -12 exp(-(1662±41)/ T )cm 3/(mol·s). The tropospheric lifetime of HFC 134a is estimated to be 10.5 years, which is in excellent agreement with the most recent results.

Development of plasma sources for Dipole Research EXperiment(DREX)

Dipole Research EXperiment（DREX） is a new terrella device as part of the Space Plasma Environment Research Facility（SPERF） for laboratory studies of space physics relevant to the inner magnetospheric plasmas. Adequate plasma sources are very important for DREX to achieve its scientific goals. According to different research requirements, there are two density regimes for DREX. The low density regime will be achieved by an electron cyclotron resonance（ECR） system for the ‘whistler/chorus＇ wave investigation, while the high density regime will be achieved by biased cold cathode discharge for the desired ‘Alfvén＇ wave study. The parameters of ‘whistler/chorus＇ waves and ‘Alfvén＇ waves are determined by the scaling law between space and laboratory plasmas in the current device. In this paper, the initial design of these two plasma sources for DREX is described. Focus is placed on the chosen frequency and operation mode of the ECR system which will produce relatively low density ‘artificial radiation belt＇ plasmas and the seed electrons, followed by the design of biased cold cathode discharge to generate plasma with high density.

Soft switching circuit to improve efficiency of all solid-state Marx modulator for DBDs

For an all solid-state Marx modulator applied in dielectric barrier discharges（DBDs）,hard switching results in a very low efficiency.In this paper,a series resonant soft switching circuit,which series an inductance with DBD capacitor,is proposed to reduce the power loss.The power loss of the all circuit status with hard switching was analyzed,and the maximum power loss occurred during discharging at the rising and falling edges.The power loss of the series resonant soft switching circuit was also presented.A comparative analysis of the two circuits determined that the soft switching circuit greatly reduced power loss.The experimental results also demonstrated that the soft switching circuit improved the power transmission efficiency of an all solid-state Marx modulator for DBDs by up to 3 times.

Ion resonance causes striations in electronegative rf glow discharges

With the support by the National Natural Science Foundation of China,Dr Liu Yongxin(刘永新)and his coworkers at the Key Laboratory of Materials Modification by Laser,Ion,and Electron Beams(Ministry of Education),School of Physics and Optoelectronic Technology,Dalian University of Technology,observed,for the first time,the self-organized striated structures of the plasma emission in