A travelling wave sustained hydrogen discharge: modelling and experiment

A model has been developed for a surface wave sustained hydrogen discharge which, in a self-consistent way, accounts for the main plasma balances governing the discharge production, including bull; and surface processes. The approach used self-consistently describes the axial discharge structure, i.e. the axial distribution of charged particle concentrations, population densities of excited species and neutrals, taking into account inhomogeneous gas heating along the plasma column as well as plasma-wall interactions. A spatially resolved experimental investigation into the distribution of electron density, atomic line intensity and gas temperature confirms the main trends of the model predictions.