At the basis of our understanding of dielectric breakdown, i.e., gas discharges, is Townsend’s theory. Its formulation as Paschen’s law describes non-thermal, self-sustained discharges occurring in hi..
At the basis of our understanding of dielectric breakdown, i.e., gas discharges, is Townsend’s theory. Its formulation as Paschen’s law describes non-thermal, self-sustained discharges occurring in high voltage, low current, and low-pressure conditions between two parallel plate electrodes (Raizer et al., 1991). Paschen’s law has been developed for various gas mixtures but does not traditionally consider electrodes’ geometries and materials. Here we propose to develop a new formalism for equations adapted to these constraints and an experimental setup for its validation. The discharges are produced in Embry Riddle Dusty Plasma Chamber (DPC), where the critical (initiation) voltage V_cr is measured at specific pressures p and distance d in air and CO_2 mixtures comparable to Earth and Mars atmospheres. We show that the V. Engel-Steenbeck equation (e.g., Fridman & Kennedy, 2004): V_cr=B(pd)/(C+ln(pd))(where C=ln(A)-lnln(1/γ+1), A and B are empirically determined coefficients for each gas mixture and γ is the secondary electron emission coefficient) does not adequately characterize the critical voltage of non-planar geometries. This work supports the validation of new proposed formalism and improvement of safety systems subject to potential discharges.
