Low frequency sheath instability stimulated by the resonant absorption of a short microwave pulse

Abstract

Summary form only given, as follows. One possibility for efficient transfer of electromagnetic energy into a plasma is to use the so-called resonant absorption which occurs when a p-polarized electromagnetic wave is incident obliquely in nonuniform plasma. This process is characterized by the efficient conversion of an electromagnetic wave to electrostatic one near the critical plasma density, where the frequency of the incident wave is equal to the local plasma frequency. One of the results of resonant absorption process consists of the modification of the distribution function of plasma particles, which could the switch plasma into a nonequilibrium state and, consequently, can stimulate some instabilities in the resonance region. In this work we represent our experimental studies of collisionless low frequency instabilities of a positively-biased electrode stimulated by the resonant absorption of a short microwave pulse in an unmagnetized plasma.