Plasma-wall transition and sheath formation

Giovanni Manfredi (1) , Fabrice Valsaque (1)

1 LPMIA - Laboratoire de physique des milieux ionisés et applications

A review of the theoretical and computational aspects of plasma-wall transition is presented. The conditions for the existence of plasma sheaths in front of a solid surface are established. Various regimes are analyzed -collisionless and collisional, fluid and kinetic, with and without ionization. The partition of the plasma-wall transition into distinct regions (Debye sheath, quasineutral presheath, magnetic presheath, etc...) is also discussed. Applications to the theory of electrostatic probes are illustrated by means of a recently developed kinetic model. The influence of the probe on ion temperature measurements is studied in detail.

Mots clés: Numerical methods; Plasma sheaths; Plasma wall interactions; Plasma physics

Domaines: Physique des plasmas [physics.plasm-ph]; Plasmas

Giovanni Manfredi, Fabrice Valsaque. Plasma-wall transition and sheath formation. Le Vide, 2002, 306 (4/4), pp.810-835. ⟨hal-03313380⟩