Low temperature plasmas

During the last years the physics of low temperature plasmas has grown in importance, especially because of their various technological applications. Besides their well known employment in gas discharge lamps for light production, low temperature plasmas are widely used in advanced technologies such as, e.g., in microelectronics. High-technology applications promote the further development of applied and basic research in this field. After describing the main properties of low temperature plasmas a theoretical approach is given. Starting from the general kinetic theory of a plasma as a many-particle system it is shown that by means of several averaging procedures an appropriate macroscopic description can be found. After introducing the rate equations and explaining the relaxation processes the so called local thermodynamic equilibrium (LTE) is defined and a thermodynamic description of LTE plasmas is presented. Special attention is paid to the effects of nonideality, e.g. the plasma phase transitions. Because of its practical importance in applications and for plasma diagnostics a separate section deals with plasma radiation. After giving a short introduction to the physics of plasma-wall interaction several types of gas discharges are briefly described. Finally, the most important applications of low temperature plasmas are reviewed.