Abstract
A powerful method for the study of time-dependent electron kinetics inspatially one-dimensional plasmas is presented. The method is based on thesolution of the space- and time-dependent kinetic equation for the electronvelocity distribution function in two-term approximation. The resultingthree-dimensional partial differential equation for the isotropic part of thevelocity distribution function is numerically solved as an initial-boundaryvalueproblem over the space of the spatial coordinate and the total energyproceeding in time. As an application, the spatiotemporal relaxation ofelectrons in the column-anode plasma of a glow discharge in krypton, actedupon by a space-independent electric field and initiated by a constantelectron influx at the cathode side of the plasma, is studied. The electronrelaxation process is traced up to the establishment into a spatiallystructured, time-independent state. A detailed analysis of the spatiotemporalbehaviour of the velocity distribution function and relevant macroscopicquantities of the electrons is given for different electric field strengthsand boundary conditions. In particular, a significant increase in therelaxation time of the spatiotemporal electron relaxation compared with therelaxation time to approach steady state in spatially homogeneous plasmas hasbeen found.
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