Laser-guided energetic discharges over large air gaps by electric-field enhanced plasma filaments.

ABSTRACT: Recent works on plasma channels produced during the propagation of ultrashort and intense laser pulses in air demonstrated the guiding of electric discharges along the laser path. However, the short plasma lifetime limits the length of the laser-guided discharge. In this paper, the conductivity and lifetime of long plasma channels produced by ultrashort laser pulses is enhanced efficiently over many orders of magnitude by the electric field of a hybrid AC-DC high-voltage source. The AC electric pulse from a Tesla coil allowed to stimulate and maintain the highly conductive channel during few milliseconds in order to guide a subsequent 500 times more energetic discharge from a 30-kV DC source. This DC discharge was laser-guided over an air gap length of two metres, which is more than two or

SUBMITTER: Theberge F 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5214843 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature