Related papers: Quantitative modeling of streamer discharge branch…
It is by now well understood that large sprite discharges at the low air densities of the mesosphere are physically similar to small streamer discharges in air at standard temperature and pressure. This similarity is based on Townsend…
Streamer electrical discharges are often investigated with computer simulations of density models (also called drift-diffusion-reaction models). We review these models, detailing their physical foundations, their range of validity and the…
In sufficiently large gaps and electric fields, discharge streamers do branch. In [Arrayas et al., PRL 88, 174502 (2002)], we observed streamer branching numerically within a deterministic particle density model and explained it as a…
In dielectric breakdown, the phenomena of streamers formation and spontaneous branching is commonly observed. A deterministic negative streamer model is reviewed in this article. We recently have proposed that this reduced model is able to…
Photoionization plays a crucial role in achieving accurate quantitative predictions in SF6 streamer simulations, but accurate models for SF6 photoionization remains limited, motivating this paper. First, we develop a computational model for…
The dynamics of positive and negative streamers is numerically simulated in atmospheric pressure air. It is shown that positive and negative streamers behave in radically different ways when decelerating and stopping. When the head…
We present a computational framework for simulating filamentary electric discharges, in which channels are represented as conducting cylindrical segments. The framework requires a model that predicts the position, radius, and line…
We introduce a 3D hybrid model for streamer discharges that follows the dynamics of single electrons in the region with strong field enhancement at the streamer tip while approximating the many electrons in the streamer interior as…
Streamers often constitute the first stage of dielectric breakdown in strong electric fields: a nonlinear ionization wave transforms a non-ionized medium into a weakly ionized nonequilibrium plasma. New understanding of this old phenomenon…
Standard photographs of streamer discharges show a two-dimensional projection. We here present stereo-photographic images that resolve their three-dimensional structure. We describe the stereoscopic set-up and evaluation, and we present…
To find a viable alternative to SF6 with growing climate change regulations, proper evaluation of alternatives such as compressed air ought to be done. For medium voltage applications, the withstand voltage is used as the dimensioning…
We explain a mechanism for branching of a planar negative front. Branching occurs as the result of a balance between the destabilizing effect of impact ionization and the stabilizing effect of electron diffusion on ionization fronts. The…
A recently proposed Following Streamer mechanism (Feng et al. 2025 Phys. Rev. Applied 23 064039) seeks to explain how floating metal particles induce SF6 streamer breakdown in the combined gap. This mechanism is derived from a 2D…
We simulate short positive and negative streamers in air at standard temperature and pressure. They evolve in homogeneous electric fields or emerge from needle electrodes with voltages of 10 to 20 kV. The streamer velocity at given streamer…
Sprite discharges are electrical discharges that initiate from the lower ionosphere during intense lightning storms, manifesting themselves optically as flashes of light that last a few milliseconds. This study unravels sprite initiation…
Streamers are the first stage of sparks and lightning; they grow due to a strongly enhanced electric field at their tips; this field is created by a thin curved space charge layer. These multiple scales are already challenging when the…
The interaction of streamers in nitrogen-oxygen mixtures such as air is studied. First, an efficient method for fully three-dimensional streamer simulations in multiprocessor machines is introduced. With its help, we find two competing…
This paper focuses on the three-dimensional simulation of the photoionization in streamer discharges, and provides a general framework to efficiently and accurately calculate the photoionization model using the integral form. The simulation…
This paper contains the foundation for a new Particle-In-Cell model for gas discharges, based on Ito diffusion and Kinetic Monte Carlo (KMC). In the new model the electrons are described with a microscopic drift-diffusion model rather than…
A streamer coupling theory is developed to describe the formation of homogenous emission, and the high moving speed of emission patterns in high pressure discharges. By considering the effects of both electron diffusion and electronic drift…