Reduction in the breakdown voltage of a high-pressure discharge with an array of 200-400-μm-diameter microdischarges: application to arc lamp ignition

Author

Wagner, C.J. ; Ostrom, N.P. ; Park, S.-J. ; Gao, J. ; Eden, J.G.

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. & Comput. Eng., Illinois Univ., Urbana, IL, USA

Volume

30

Issue

1

fYear

2002

fDate

2/1/2002 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

194

Lastpage

195

Abstract

The breakdown voltage (Vs) for a discharge in Ar at pressures between 35 and 300 torr has been reduced significantly with an array of cylindrical microdischarge devices mounted behind the tungsten cathode. For P_Ar = 50 torr, V_S drops by approximately a factor of two, relative to that for a conventional discharge, when the microdischarge array is in operation. The injection of electron-ion pairs into the anode-cathode gap region by the array also decreases the formative and statistical time lags associated with the startup of a cold lamp

Keywords

arc lamps; arrays; discharges (electric); electric breakdown; plasma pressure; 35 to 300 torr; Ar; Ar discharge; anode-cathode gap region; arc lamp ignition; array; breakdown voltage; cold lamp; cylindrical microdischarge devices; electron-ion pairs; formative time lags; gas breakdown; high-pressure discharge; lamp ignition; microdischarge array; microdischarges; statistical time lags; tungsten cathode; Argon; Assembly; Breakdown voltage; Cathodes; Electric breakdown; Electrodes; Ignition; Lamps; Pulse measurements; Tungsten;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Plasma Science, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0093-3813

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/TPS.2002.1003990

Filename

1003990