Synchronization of positive surface streamers triggered by vacuum ultraviolet in atmosphere

Abstract

The synchronous generation of the surface streamer discharges from two electrodes in air is investigated in terms of wavelength and intensity of the discharge light as a trigger for the synchronization of the surface streamers. It is found that the light emitted from the first streamer causes the photoelectron emission and the photoionization in the vicinity of the opposing electrode, triggering synchronous discharge of the second streamer. The wavelength of the light contributing to this phenomenon is shorter than 250 nm, with a remarkable rise in synchronization probability from 164 nm to 115 nm. This is considered to be due to the existence of the photoabsorption windows for oxygen in this vacuum ultraviolet region. These results suggest that the photon energy required to supply initial electrons sufficient to trigger the surface streamers on an acrylic resin insulator is at least 5 eV and more enhancement is found at 8 and 10 eV in this study.

Collective phenomena in volume and surface barrier discharges

“…In some experiments a striking synchronization of current filaments in SDs was reported [60,66]. Kashiwagi and Itoh investigated this effect in detail and showed that UV radiation from the first filament was responsible for triggering adjacent filaments.…”

Diffuse Coplanar Surface Barrier Discharge in Artificial Air: Statistical Behaviour of Microdischarges

“…Events below the diagonal in the incidence matrix represent cases where more than one microdischarge path (filament) is generated within the 10-20 ns -the resolution limit of individual current pulse detection. In principle two alternatives could lead to such a case: a) two or more independent current pulses occurred, but not resolved due to the resolution limit; b) two or more microdischarges are generated within a few ns by the mechanism of microdischarge triggering via energetic photons [52][53][54].…”

Spatio-temporal breakdown in surface DBDs: evidence of collective effect

“…The proposed hypothesis explained these high currents by the triggered breakdown of several plasma filaments, but their existence could not be investigated by experiments. Moreover, Kashiwagi et al showed that, under certain conditions, a first streamer could trigger a second one [10]. A new study has shown that, in surface discharges, the streamers propagate simultaneously [11].…”

“…Morphological characteristics of surface discharges were investigated by dust figures [10,[12][13][14]25], Pockels effect [15] or imaging [11,16,17,22,26]. These studies showed a structured arrangement of the charges, and revealed a spatial increase in the plasma area with the time and amplitude of applied voltage [8,16,17,[25][26][27].…”