A Study of an Ion Flow of a Combined Vacuum and Surface Discharge Plasma

Abstract

The energy and mass compositions of a stream of combined discharge plasma have been studied. The discharge was a combination of a vacuum gap breakdown and a discharge on the surface of a dielectric. Explosive emission electrons from the cathode accelerated plasma formed by a surface breakdown on the walls of a hole in a dielectric insert located in front of the anode. The measurements revealed that the plasma stream contained hydrogen ions only. The flux of protons consisted of the main low-energy (up to 2 keV) part and high-energy low-intensity groups of protons with energies of up to 25 keV. The main low-energy part had energies characteristic of the flux of ions in a surface breakdown and depended little on the discharge pulse amplitude. The energy spectra of the flux of ions were the same at the pulselengths of 100 ns and 1 . This was an indication that the processes of formation and acceleration of plasma were complete in a time of less than 100 ns.