INVESTIGATIONS ON THE FORMATION AND PROPAGATION OF THE PLASMA IN MHD CHANNEL FLOWS.

Abstract

The report contains specific investigations relevant to technical plasmas, in particular plasmas in energy conversion systems: A kinetic theory of subsonic and supersonic transport processes is given for weakly ionized and fully ionized plasmas. Subsonic and supersonic transport processes are discussed by means of typical examples (current transport in strong electric fields, thermal nonequilibrium in strong electric fields, test particle problem). Analytical solutions are established for the boundary-value problem of the convection and diffusion of temperature and particle distributions in gaseous flows, and for the nonlinear Helmholtz equation describing the ionization-recombination kinetics with diffusion. A perturbation theoretical solution is derived for the nonlinear space charge problem of a plane plasma capacitor in a strong electric field, and an analytical model is developed for the nonlinear space charge oscillations excited by application of a strong voltage pulse. A preliminary account on the problem of ionization of excited atoms by turbulent electric fields in plasmas and the magnetohydrodynamic turbulence in presence of a strong magnetic field is presented. (Author)

Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Jan 26, 1970
Accession Number
AD0700927

Entities

People

  • Horst E. Wilhelm

Organizations

  • Colorado State University

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Air Platforms
  • Energy and Power Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Boundary Value Problems
  • Channel Flow
  • Convection
  • Diffusion
  • Electric Fields
  • Energy Conversion
  • Equations
  • Flow
  • Helmholtz Equations
  • Ionization
  • Kinetic Theory
  • Kinetics
  • Magnetic Fields
  • Space Charge
  • Supersonic Transport Aircraft
  • Transport Ships

Fields of Study

  • Physics

Readers

  • Plasma Physics / Magnetohydrodynamics
  • Plasma Physics.

Technology Areas

  • Hypersonics
  • Hypersonics - Hypersonic Flight
  • Space
  • Space - Hall-Effect Thruster