No Arabic abstract
An interesting aspect of complex plasma is its ability to self-organize into a variety of structural configurations and undergo transitions between these states. A striking phenomenon is the isotropic-to-string transition observed in electrorheological complex plasma under the influence of a symmetric ion wakefield. Such transitions have been investigated using the Plasma Kristall-4 (PK-4) microgravity laboratory on the International Space Station (ISS). Recent experiments and numerical simulations have shown that, under PK-4 relevant discharge conditions, the seemingly homogeneous DC discharge column is highly inhomogeneous, with large axial electric field oscillations associated with ionization waves occurring on microsecond time scales. A multi-scale numerical model of the dust-plasma interactions is employed to investigate the role of the electric field on the charge of individual dust grains, the ion wakefield, and the order of string-like structures. Results are compared to dust strings formed in similar conditions in the PK-4 experiment.
We report on the observation of the self-excited dust density waves in the dc discharge complex plasma. The experiments were performed under microgravity conditions in the Plasmakristall-4 facility on board the International Space Station. In the experiment, the microparticle cloud was first trapped in an inductively coupled plasma, then released to drift for some seconds in a dc discharge with constant current. After that the discharge polarity was reversed. DC plasma containing a drifting microparticle cloud was found to be strongly non-uniform in terms of microparticle drift velocity and plasma emission in accord with [Zobnin et.al., Phys. Plasmas 25, 033702 (2018)]. In addition to that, non-uniformity in the self-excited wave pattern was observed: In the front edge of the microparticle cloud (defined as head), the waves had larger phase velocity than in the rear edge (defined as tail). Also, after the polarity reversal, the wave pattern exhibited several bifurcations: Between each of the two old wave crests, a new wave crest has formed. These bifurcations, however, occurred only in the head of the microparticle cloud. We show that spatial variations of electric field inside the drifting cloud play an important role in the formation of the wave pattern. Comparison of the theoretical estimations and measurements demonstrate the significant impact of the electric field on the phase velocity of the wave. The same theoretical approach applied to the instability growth rate, showed agreement between estimated and measured values.
A pin liquid anode DC discharge is generated in open air without any additional gas feeding to form self-organized patterns (SOPs) on various liquid interfaces. Axially resolved emission spectra of the whole discharge reveal that the self-organized patterns are formed below a dark region and are visible mainly due to the N2 transitions. The high energy N2 (C) level is mainly excited by the impact of electrons heated by the local increased electric field at the interface. For the first time, the effect of the liquid type on the SOP formation is presented. With almost the same other discharge conditions, the formed SOPs are significantly different from HCl and H2SO4 liquid anodes. The SOP difference is repeated when the discharge current and gap distance change for both liquid anodes. The variations of SOP size and discretization as a function of discharge current and gap distance are discussed and confirm that different SOPs are formed by the HCl liquid anode from tap water or the H2SO4 liquid anode. A possible explanation is brought up to explain the dependence of SOPs on the liquid type.
This paper reports experiments on self$-$excited dust acoustic waves (DAWs) and its propagation characteristics in a magnetized rf discharge plasma. The DAWs are spontaneously excited in dusty plasma after adding more particles in the confining potential well and found to propagate in the direction of streaming ions. The spontaneous excitation of such low-frequency modes is possible due to the instabilities associated with streaming ions through the dust grain medium. The background E-field and neutral pressure determine the stability of excited DAWs. The characteristics of DAWs strongly depend on the strength of external magnetic field. The magnetic field of strength B $<$ 0.05 T only modifies the characteristics of propagating waves in dusty plasma at moderate power and pressure, P = 3.5 W and p = 27 Pa respectively. It is found that DAWs start to be damped with increasing the magnetic field beyond B $>$ 0.05 T and get completely damped at higher magnetic field B $sim$ 0.13 T. After lowering the power and pressure to 3 W and 23 Pa respectively, the excited DAWs in the absence of B are slightly unstable. In this case, the magnetic field only stabilizes and modifies the propagation characteristics of DAWs while the strength of B is increased up to 0.1 T or even higher. The modification of the sheath electric field where particles are confined in the presence of the external magnetic field is the main cause of the modification and damping of the DAWs in a magnetized rf discharge plasma.
Interaction of an intense electron beam with a finite-length, inhomogeneous plasma is investigated numerically. The plasma density profile is maximal in the middle and decays towards the plasma edges. Two regimes of the two-stream instability are observed. In one regime, the frequency of the instability is the plasma frequency at the density maximum and plasma waves are excited in the middle of the plasma. In the other regime, the frequency of the instability matches the local plasma frequency near the edges of the plasma and the intense plasma oscillations occur near plasma boundaries. The latter regime appears sporadically and only for strong electron beam currents. This instability generates copious amount of suprathermal electrons. The energy transfer to suprathermal electrons is the saturation mechanism of the instability.
Self-organized patterns of spots on a at metallic anode in a cylindrical glow dis- charge tube are simulated self-consistently. A standard model of a glow discharge is used, comprising conservation and transport equations for a single species of ion and electrons, written with the use of the drift-diffusion and local-field approximations, and the Poisson equation. The computation domain is the region from the anode to the discharge column; only processes in the near-anode region are considered. Multiple solutions, existing in the same range of discharge current and describing modes with and without anode spots, are computed by means of a stationary solver. The computed spots exhibited unexpected behavior. A reversal of the local anode current density in the middle of each of the spots was found, i.e. mini-cathodes are formed inside the spots. The solutions do not fit into the conventional pattern of self-organization in bistable nonlinear dissipative systems; e.g. the modes are not joined by bifurcations.