2012/06/26 by M. Y. Pustylnik, Mikhail Pustylnik, Alexei Ivlev +11
Engineering · Physics and Astronomy · #Astrophysics and Star Formation Studies #Dust and Plasma Wave Phenomena #Laser-induced spectroscopy and plasma #physics.plasm-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1063/1.4757213
published as Phys. Plasmas 19, 103701 (2012)
arxiv created 2012/06/26 · openalex publication_date 2012/10/01 · arxiv updated 2012/10/18 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
A hypothesis on the physical mechanism generating the heartbeat instability in complex (dusty) plasmas is presented. It is suggested that the instability occurs due to the periodically repeated critical transformation on the boundary between the microparticle-free area (void) and the complex plasma. The critical transformation is supposed to be analogous to the formation of the sheath in the vicinity of an electrode. The origin of the transformation is the loss of the electrons and ions on microparticles surrounding the void. We have shown that this hypothesis is consistent with the experimentally measured stability parameter range, with the evolution of the plasma glow intensity and microparticle dynamics during the instability, as well as with the observed excitation of the heartbeat instability by an intensity-modulated laser beam (inducing the modulation of plasma density).