Experiments of Discharge Guiding using Strongly and Weakly Ionized Plasma Channel produced by KrF Laser

Abstract

We have studied the feasibility of a hybrid discharge method (to guide the discharge with strongly and weakly ionized plasma channels) of a long guiding laser plasma channel. Charged particle densities in a weakly ionized plasma channel were measured as a function of the laser intensity. Critical condition of the weakly ionized plasma to guide an electrical streamer was determined. The electrical resistibility of plasma channel to generate the self-propagating streamer is smaller than 3.5 Ωm. The self-propagating streamer could heat the channel and leads to a main discharge.