Impact of the pre-deposited surface charge on the breakdown in a dielectric barrier discharge in the air

Abstract

Abstract The electrical charge deposited on a dielectric barrier of dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) changes markedly the configuration and strength of the local electric field both on the barrier and in the gas gap. In turn, a change in the local electric field affects the rate of ionization multiplication of electrons in this area and, accordingly, influences the breakdown conditions providing the appearance of microdischarges in a barrier discharge. The features of the DBD breakdown in the presence of the pre-deposited charge on a dielectric barrier were investigated by the example of the plane-to-plane DBD operating in the ambient air at atmospheric pressure. The electric charge deposition on the barrier was performed in advance with the use of the pulsed pin-to-plane barrier corona. Corona discharge allows one to control both the amount and location of the pre-deposited charge. The slow increasing voltage of the needed polarity was used to initiate the breakdown in the plane-to-plane DBD. The slow increasing applied voltage provides the multiple breakdowns forming the “one by one” sequence of MDs. The analysis of the obtained results was performed on the base of the conception of the necessary and sufficient conditions for the MDs formation.