Publications

Selected publication  

Dvonč L., Janda M.: Study of transient spark discharge properties using kinetic modeling, IEEE Trans. Plasma Phys. 43 (8), 2562-2570 (2015).
citations: 5  

Abstract

The kinetic model simulating plasma chemistry induced by Transient Spark (TS) discharge in
air is presented in this work. The TS is a DC-driven self-pulsing discharge of streamer-to-spark
transition type. Presented kinetic model defines the temporal evolution of reduced electric field
strength E/N , gas temperature and density of neutrals N during the evolution of TS discharge, so
that calculated electron density is in agreement with experimental results. We studied the mechanism
of the streamer-to-spark transition and breakdown in the TS using this model. We assume that the
breakdown mechanism in TS is based on the gas density decrease and can be summarized as follows:
heating of the channel → increase of the pressure → hydrodynamic expansion → decrease of N in
the core of the channel → increase of E/N → acceleration of ionization processes. However, this
mechanism is influenced by species accumulated due to previous TS pulses at higher TS repetition
frequencies. Sensitivity analysis focused on major electron loss and production processes indicates
an important role of the amount of O2 dissociated by the previous pulses. Lower density of O2 means
lower rate of electron attachment, while accumulated atomic oxygen atoms lead to acceleration of
electron detachment processes.