Model for a quasistationary heavy inert-gas beam plasma

A study is made of the quasistationary dissociative-recombining plasma formed by the passage of a homogeneous high-energy electron beam through a dense inert gas. A fairly general kinetic model is proposed that enables one to derive physically clear analytical solutions. The effects of disequilibrium on the electron temperature are discussed. A detailed consideration demonstrates the characteristic relationship between the plasma parameters and the external parameters when there is complete predominance of the dissociative recombination, and when the electron temperature is controlled by inelastic collisions with excited particles, in which case it is independent of the external parameters and has a minimum value of approx.0.4 eV. This is due to an unusual energy-transformation mechanism and the buildup of concentrations of excited and charged particles