Mathematical modeling of plasma opening switches Original Research Article

This article investigates Plasma Opening Switches with the help of an implicit code. The plasma is described using a collisional bifluid model, where the low ratio of electronic and ionic masses allows us to drop inertial terms from the electronic momentum equation. This asymptotic model filters plasma oscillations from the equations and the scheme is stable for time steps exceeding the electron plasma period. However, an implicit coupling of fluid and Maxwellʹs equations is considered because of the presence of a damped mode, whose characteristic time scale restricts the time steps of explicit schemes to small values compared to the simulation requirements. The stability of the scheme is illustrated by simulating certain operating phases of the Plasma Erosion Opening Switch.