Kinetic model for low pressure glow discharges in the presence of dust particles

摘要

A kinetic model for electrons in dusty plasmas is developed. The Boltzmann and the dust charging balance equations are solved self-consistently. The dependence of the dust particle surface potential on plasma parameters and the effects of particulate contamination on electron energy distribution are investigated for direct-current argon glow discharges. It is shown that the dust particle surface potential obtained from this model is higher than that obtained for a Maxwellian electron distribution, and that the higher energy portion of the electron distribution is reduced in the presence of dust particles. Electron-dust collection and electron-atom inelastic collision are the main electron energy loss processes, and the electron energy loss due to electron-dust elastic collision is negligibly small for 10(sup -16)V cm(sup 2) < E/N < 10(sup -15) V cm(sup 2) under the discharge conditions considered in this work, where E is the externally applied electric field and N is the argon atom density. (author). 16 refs, 8 figs. (Atomindex citation 28:024140)