Interaction of charged dust particles. Debye quasimolecule

An analysis is made of an electrically neutral system of two small positive charges surrounded by a common cloud of Boltzmann-distributed electrons. This system, which simulates macroparticle interaction in a dusty plasma, is called a Debye quasimolecule. Calculations are made of the force and potential interaction energy of shielded dust particles as a function of the distance between them. It is shown that the electron shells are polarized so that the forces of attraction of the dust particles in a Debye quasimolecule predominate over the forces of repulsion of their like charges. This may occur up to distances equal to the size of the dust particles. It is concluded that metastable dusty liquids and crystals cannot exist when the electron clouds of the charged particles obey a Boltzmann distribution. (C) 1999 American Institute of Physics. [S1063-7850(99)02908-0].