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A streamer discharge model is developed to analyse the characteristics of a pulsed positive streamer discharge in point-to-plane electrodes filled with oxygen–nitrogen mixed gas at room temperature and atmospheric pressure. In this paper we study the mechanisms of O and N radical production in an atmospheric-pressure streamer discharge. To confirm the validity of the simulation model, the discharge emission of light and the discharge current are compared with experimental data at several voltages in gas mixtures with 2–20% oxygen concentrations. The calculated streak picture and the axial distribution of streamer luminous intensity are in good agreement with our previous experimental results. After demonstrating the reliability of the model, we performed a numerical study on radical production by the streamer discharge. The experimentally obtained axial distributions of oxygen radical production in O2(20%)/N2 and nitrogen radical production in O2(2%)/N2 are successfully reproduced in our simulation. For the production of nitrogen radicals, two-step dissociation through the vibrationally excited states is predominant.

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The azimuthal plasma current in a magnetic nozzle of a radiofrequency plasma thruster is experimentally identified by measuring the plasmainduced magnetic field. The axial plasma momentum increases over about 20 cm downstream of the thruster exit due to the Lorentz force arising from the azimuthal current. The measured current shows that the azimuthal current is given by the sum of the electron diamagnetic drift and E B × drift currents, where the latter component decreases with an increase in the magnetic field strength; hence the azimuthal current approaches the electron diamagnetic drift one for the strong magnetic field. The Lorentz force calculated from the measured azimuthal plasma current and the radial magnetic field is smaller than the directly measured force exerted to the magnetic field, which indicates the existence of a nonnegligible Lorentz force in the source tube.

The effect of pulse rise rate on a streamer discharge is investigated through both experiments and simulations. Pulsed voltages with a pulse rise rate of 0.11-0.52 kV ns −1 are applied to point-to-plane electrode configurations, and the effects are observed from ICCD photographs. The streamer emission of light is simulated by a previously developed two-dimensional streamer simulation model, and the simulation results are compared with experimental results. The results show that as the pulse rise rate is decreased, there is a decrease in the discharge current, velocity of the primary streamer, diameter of the streamer channel and emission length of the secondary streamer. The simulated reduced electric field of the primary streamer head remains constant and does not depend on the pulse rise rate. The simulated temporal variations of O and OH radical production show that almost the same number of the radicals are produced in the primary streamer, regardless of the pulse rise rate. However, the radical production in the secondary streamer decreases as the pulse rise rate decreases. Therefore, the pulse rise rate affects the ratio of radical production in the primary streamer to that in the secondary streamer.