Experimental Study on Performance Characteristics of Plasma Actuator Composed of DC and AC Electrode

Abstract

Tri-electrode plasma actuator (TED-PA) has two high voltage electrodes (AC and DC) and a grounded electrode. It can induce a stronger jet than the conventional plasma actuator (DBDPA), that is attributed to jet generation not only at the AC electrode but also at the DC one. Especially, the jet from the DC electrode dominantly contributes to the stronger jet. In this study, for obtaining the guideline to optimize the design of the TED-PA, we conduct the experiments aiming to verify the mechanism of the DC discharge enhancement by the interaction with the dielectric barrier discharge at the AC electrode, that is important phenomena to achieve strong jet generation. As a result, the discharge photograph shows that the discharge at the DC electrode becomes stronger when the dielectric barrier discharge at the AC electrode becomes stronger. In addition, the jet from the DC electrode also becomes stronger with the DC discharge. The results support the results reported in our previous numerical work showing that the mechanism of the DC discharge enhancement is the electrons supply from the DBD at the AC electrode to the DC discharge.