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The RF plasma slit jet, which produces 150 mm wide streaming plasma outside the jet body, exhibits exciting self-organization phenomena that resemble the self-organized patterns of dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) filaments. Similarly, as in DBD, the filaments are surrounded by an inhibition zone that does not allow two filaments to come closer to each other. With fast camera imaging, we observed the filamentary character of the discharge in all the studied gas feeds (Ar, Ar/N2, and Ar/O2). Still, the visual appearance of the filaments in the plasma and their interaction with a dielectric surface depended significantly on the gas feed. As the breakdown voltage in pure Ar is relatively low compared to the applied one, new filaments form frequently. Such newly created filaments disrupted the characteristic inter-filament distance, forcing the system to rearrange. The frequent ignition and decay processes in Ar led to short filament lifetimes (0.020–0.035 s) and their high jitter speed (0.9–1.7 m/s), as determined with an image processing custom code based on Gwyddion libraries. The number of filaments was lower in the Ar/O2 and Ar/N2 mixtures. It was attributed to a loss of energy in the excitation of rotational and vibrational levels and oxygen electronegativity. Since the probability of low-current side discharges transitioning into the full plasma filaments was limited in these gas mixtures, the self-organized pattern was seldom disrupted, leading to lesser movement and longer lifetimes. Unlike in Ar or Ar/O2, the constricted filaments in Ar/N2 were surrounded by diffuse plasma plumes, likely connected to the presence of long-lived nitrogen species. We demonstrated in the polypropylene treatment that the self-organization phenomena affected the treatment uniformity.

A recently presented novel plasma source generating discharge in liquids based on the pin-hole discharge configuration is characterized in detail. The system is supplied by DC non-pulsing high voltage of both polarities in NaCl water solutions at a conductivity range of 100-15 000 μS/cm. The discharge itself shows self-pulsing operation. The discharge ignition is observed in micro bubbles by transient discharge followed by a glow discharge in positive polarity at lower conductivities propagating inside the bubbles. At high conductivities, the glow regime is particularly replaced by a more energetic sequence of transient discharges followed by a shorter glow mode operation. The transient regime probability and its intensity are higher in the negative discharge polarity. The transient discharge produces acoustic waves and shock waves, which are observed at the moment of the bubble cavitation. The average gas temperature of 700-1500 K was calculated from the lowest OH (A-X) 0-0 band transitions. The average electron concentrations of 10 20 -10 23 m −3 were calculated from H α and H β line profiles. Finally, the production of a chemically active species is determined by hydrogen peroxide energy yields related to the energy consumption of the whole interelectrode system. All these quantities are dependent on the solution conductivity, the discharge polarity, and the applied power.

Recently, the bactericidal and fungicidal effects of plasma-activated water (PAW) have been confirmed for its application in agriculture. Although the PAW application is beneficial in plant growth, no information is available about processes induced by PAW in soil. This paper gives the first experimental results about PAW’s influence on selected physical and physical–chemical properties of soil. PAW was prepared using the dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) operating in the multistreamer mode at a frequency of 11 kHz. The total energy consumption was 60 J/ml. The obtained results show minimal changes in the natural water evaporation from the soil exposed to PAW, slower tap water absorption if a higher amount of PAW (16 doses per 10 ml to 90 g of the soil) is applied, as well as water retention in the soil of over 30%. The soil pH remains in the neutral range of values even at the highest applied PAW amount of 1.7 weight of soil, which represents the best conditions with respect to the plant growth. Thus, we can conclude that the PAW application, even at high amounts, has no negative influence on the physical and physical–chemical properties of soil and it can be safely applied in sustainable, environmentally friendly agriculture.

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