Numerical study of an electrostatic plasma sheath with non‐thermal electrons and charged nanoparticles

Abstract

AbstractNumerical solutions of the multi‐fluid equations are used to investigate the effects of non‐thermal electrons on the structure of an electrostatic plasma sheath in the presence of nano‐sized dust grains. It is assumed that electrons obey the Cairns distribution [Cairns et al. Geophys. Res. Lett. 22, 2709 (1995)], with a parameter α that determines the effect of non‐thermal electrons and shows the deviation from the Maxwellian distribution. The results revealed that sheath parameters are strongly modified in the presence of non‐thermal electrons and with increasing α the sheath width increases. With the increase in α, the absolute dust charge increases while the dust density is reduced.