Title :
Influence of a current jump on vacuum arc parameters
Author :
Bugaev, Alexey S. ; Gushenets, Vasiliy I. ; Nikolaev, Alexey G. ; Oks, Efim M. ; Yushkov, George Y.
Author_Institution :
Inst. of High-Current Electron., Acad. of Sci., Tomsk, Russia
fDate :
8/1/1999 12:00:00 AM
Abstract :
Based on time of flight method, influence of short time vacuum arc current jump on arc plasma parameters were investigated. Superposition of the current pulse of a vacuum arc with a high operating voltage results in the appearance of ions of higher charge state in the discharge plasma and in an increase in the mean ion charge state for most of the cathode materials used in the experiment. The method of a “short-time current jump” can be also used to investigate the parameters of a vacuum arc, in particular to estimate the ion direct velocities in vacuum arc plasmas. Our estimates show that in the presence of a current step the ion velocities are almost identical for all differently charged ions and depend only on the peak current and the ion mass
Keywords :
ion mobility; plasma diagnostics; plasma transport processes; time of flight mass spectra; vacuum arcs; arc plasma parameters; charge state distribution; current pulse; current step; discharge plasma; high operating voltage; ion direct velocities; ion mass; peak current; short time vacuum arc current jump; short-time current jump; superposition; time of flight mass spectroscopy; vacuum arc parameters; Cathodes; Control systems; Ion beams; Ion sources; Plasma diagnostics; Plasma materials processing; Plasma properties; Radio control; Vacuum arcs; Voltage;
Journal_Title :
Plasma Science, IEEE Transactions on
