Caudal autotomy and regeneration of arc in a 3D gliding arc discharge plasma

Abstract

To gain a better understanding of the mechanism governing arc dynamics in 3D gliding arc discharge (GAD) plasma, the spatio-temporal evolution of GAD was investigated in a reverse vortex flow by a novel reactor with ring (powered electrode, PE) and truncated cone (ground electrode, GE) electrodes. A newly underlying mechanism governing arc evolution in 3D GAD was gained with combination of flow field simulation, synchronous electrical characteristics, intensified charge coupled device images and high-speed photos. The spatio-temporal analysis indicates that, being different from the well-known ignition–gliding–extinction mechanism occurring in traditional GAD, the PE arc root glides continuously in the 3D GAD, but the GE arc root features jumps from the end of the gliding path to the beginning of the next one. By means of the jumping, the arc auto-sheds the caudal part of the arc and a new arc tail is simultaneously generated, rather than rebuilding a new arc channel back to the shortest electrode gap. With this special behavior of caudal autotomy and regeneration, the main part of the arc remains for each jump. This new insight improves the understanding of the discharge mechanism governing arc evolution in 3D GAD and provides a reference for optimization design of gliding arc plasma in a vortex flow.

Experimental study on the discharge characteristics of an air rotating gliding arc

“…the occurrence of arc root jump, which results in a relatively short arc with the main part unchanged. A similar jump phenomenon was also found by Zhang et al [37,38]. since the rising arc voltage with the increase in arc length and shape distortion causes the breakdown between the two legs of 'J' arc.…”

Mechanism study on gliding arc (GA) plasma reforming: A combination approach of experiment and modeling

“…Different from the traditional 2D GA design, our specific design supplies a tornado gas flow in a cone-shaped chamber, this will restrain the arc channel from continuously rotating in the center of the reactor. Consequently, the GA operates at a "Caudal autotomy and regeneration" model, [57] which has been revealed in our previous work with high-speed images in a GA design.…”

Mesoporous TiO2 electrocatalysts synthesized by gliding arc plasma for oxygen evolution reaction

“…Figure 1 shows waveforms of voltage with approximately periodical changes at a larger time scale of ∼10 ms, which originates from caudal autotomy and regeneration [27]. The peak voltage of alternating-current high voltage presents a sawtooth-like pattern.…”