Comparison of three excitation schemes for cylindrical dielectric barrier discharges

Three dielectric barrier discharge jets have been analyzed mainly by spectroscopic methods. Power densities, electron concentrations, and heavy particle temperatures are in the same range for the jets. All three jets are excited by sinusoidal voltages with kilohertz frequencies. High speed imaging proves that for quite different excitation schemes the jet plasma consists of isolated, fast moving, light-emitting structures. These so-called plasma bullets are emitted at a certain phase of the excitation voltage and occur in one half-cycle only.