Nonlinear dynamic behaviors in dielectric barrier glow discharges

Complex phenomena of nonlinear dynamic behaviors in dielectric barrier glow discharge at atmospheric pressure in helium have been studied by a one-dimensional fluid model. It is shown that the system has a unique oscillatory solution when the discharge is in the conventional glow discharge. As the gas gap width is increasing, the discharge system becomes unstable and undergoes a series of bifurcation. The first bifurcation from the oscillatory state gives rise to the formation of an asymmetric state, accompanying by an axis-symmetry breaking. The second bifurcation named as temporal period doubling bifurcation makes the asymmetric discharge pulses transiting into a period-two state.