Experimental investigation on the optical emission spectroscopy of dielectric barrier discharge plasma actuators at different atmospheric pressures

S Y Xu,J S Cai,S J Tang,L Kang

doi:10.1063/1.5053602

Abstract

The experiment of dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) plasma actuator using an asymmetrical electrodes configuration is conducted to investigate optical emission spectroscopy of the plasma discharge at pressures from 0.02 to 0.1 Mpa in air mixed with various concentrations of Ar (0%, 20%, 50%, and 80%). The measurements were performed with a sinusoidal driven DBD having an amplitude of 12 kV and a frequency of 1 kHz. The diffuse DBD discharge images and the optical emission spectra are recorded successfully, and the effects of pressure and concentration of Ar are investigated, respectively. It is found that the emission intensities of air discharge increase with decreasing the pressure but increasing the concentration of Ar to some extent. Especially, when the pressure is lower than 0.04 Mpa or the concentration of Ar is over 50%, the emission intensities increase obviously rapidly. The experimental results indicate that the low pressure environment and the high concentration of Ar are beneficial to improve the performance of the DBD plasma discharge actuators.

Highlights

Dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) plasma actuator has been widely used in multiple aerospace applications, such as plasma propulsion, anti-icing, plasma stealth technology, and air flow-control.[1,2,3,4,5,6]
Researchers found that the discharge characteristics of the DBD plasma actuators depend heavily on many external parameters such as the driven voltage,[13,14] electrode shapes,[6,15,16] thickness of the barrier,[17,18] pressure environment,[19,20,21] and the mixture composition of the used gases.[14,22,23,24]
The optical emission spectra of DBD plasma discharge using an asymmetrical electrodes configuration driven by the 12 kV peak voltage with 1 kHz repetition rate are obtained under different working conditions

Summary

Introduction

Dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) plasma actuator has been widely used in multiple aerospace applications, such as plasma propulsion, anti-icing, plasma stealth technology, and air flow-control.[1,2,3,4,5,6] Especially, as one of the most promising means in achieving flow control, DBD is mainly devoted into separating the airfoil leading-edge,[7] controlling the flow boundary layer,[3] and improving the airfoil lift and drag performance.[8]. Further understanding the mechanism of DBD plasma actuators needs deeper detailed understanding of the mechanism of the discharge characteristics. A number of experimental studies have been conducted to understand the fundamental mechanism and chemical phenomena so as to improve DBD plasma actuator efficiency.[9,10,11,12] Researchers found that the discharge characteristics of the DBD plasma actuators depend heavily on many external parameters such as the driven voltage (shape, amplitude, and frequency),[13,14] electrode shapes (triangular, horseshoe, and square),[6,15,16] thickness of the barrier,[17,18] pressure environment,[19,20,21] and the mixture composition of the used gases.[14,22,23,24] For instance, Thomas et al.[25] found that the saturation body force varies linearly with applied voltage, and the DBD plasma actuators with serrated electrodes could induce higher flow velocity. The behavior of the electrical characteristics and emission intensity of the DBD

Methods

Results

Conclusion