Electrically efficient production of reactive species in a diffuse nonthermal atmospheric plasma

A simple numerical model and its associated computer code for one-dimensional simulation of atmospheric pressure helium discharges was developed. As such, three pulsed excitation voltage waveforms were considered. For each case, plasma voltage and current were computed to identify the parametric range within which the generated atmospheric plasmas were diffuse and nonthermal discharges. It was found that the pulse shape and width can be appropriately adjusted to reduce plasma-generating power by more than 50% without lowering the concentrations of charged particles and reactive species.