Investigating the effect of additional gases in an atmospheric-pressure helium plasma jet using ambient mass spectrometry

Abstract

Using ambient mass spectrometry, positive and negative ions created in an atmospheric-pressure plasma jet have been detected for a variation of different traces gases (Ar, N2, and O2) added to the flow, downstream of the main helium discharge plasma. We find that such additions can change the chemistry in the outflow plasma plume. For instance, small amounts of O2 increases the formation of positive ion clusters, e.g., water clusters H+(H2O)n (with n up to 5) through hydration reactions, but decreases the intensity of heavy negative ions detected. With the addition of Ar and N2 we see a marked decrease in the intensity of negative ions in the plume but with increased Ar+ and nitrous oxide ions (e.g., N2O+) for the two cases respectively. From broadband optical emission measurements of the glowing plasma we see that the relative emission intensity of OH radical were changed with addition of the four different gases but the emission spectra were not changed. A calculation of rotational temperature of OH radicals, indicates that the gas temperatures is about 290 K for the four different gas mixture cases.