Atmospheric Pressure Glow Discharges

Atmospheric pressure non-thermal plasmas are attractive due to their low processing costs related to the lack of a need for expensive vacuum equipment. While most atmospheric pressure plasmas are strongly nonuniform (filamentary), atmospheric pressure glow (APG) discharges provide a highly uniform plasma. They are thus of strong interest for applications in biotechnology, sterilization, and deposition of films. Our group is involved in the development of one- and two-dimensional time-dependent fluid models for atmospheric pressure glows and their experimental verification. Experimental studies use a variety of time-resolved spectroscopic methods as well as electrical characterization.

Representative publications:
“Two-dimensional space and time-resolved emission spectroscopy on atmospheric pressure glows in helium with impurities,” C. Anderson, M. Hur, P. Zhang, L. Mangolini, and U. Kortshagen, J. Appl. Phys. 96 (4), 1835-39 (2004), DOI: 10.1063/1.1773923.

“Effects of current limitation through the dielectric in atmospheric pressure glows in helium,” L. Mangolini, C. Anderson, J. Heberlein, and U. Kortshagen, J. Phys. D: Appl. Phys. 37 , 1021-1030 (2004), DOI: 10.1088/0022-3727/37/7/012.

Simulation of the APG breakdown.