Numerical investigation of energy transfer efficiency from microwave radiation to plasma in a cylindrical resonant cavity

Abstract

The paper presents a simplified numerical model of the hydrogen plasma generation process in a microwave resonant cavity. The model assumes electroneutrality and the prescribed electron temperature of the plasma, thus significantly reducing the computational cost. This allows for the parametric study in a wide range of operating pressures end electric field magnitudes (at a frequency of 2.45GHz). The prescribed model allows finding the effective range of operating pressures for the plasma generation. At low pressures, the collision rate is too low to effectively absorb all the emitted energy while at high pressures the electron conductivity drops which also reduces the absorption efficiency.