The physics of high-power arcs

Progress in the physics of high-power arcs has been largely due to a blend of detailed experimental and theoretical investigations aimed at explaining the electrical behaviour of the discharge in terms of fundamental physical processes. In the case of collision-dominated, high-pressure arcs the important role of radiative energy transfer, including strong self-absorption, has been established through the experimental and theoretical study of cylindrically symmetric, uncontaminated arc plasmas. As a result, an insight has been gained into the additional complications produced in naturally occurring high-pressure arcs by electrode vapour contamination and self-magnetically-propelled plasma flows. The application of similarity theory based upon the conservation equations of fluid mechanics has produced good correlation of the properties of arcs in transverse flows and magnetic fields under a number of different operating conditions. Criteria defining stable arc operation have been derived using stability theory whilst axisymmetric instabilities of arcs in accelerating flows have been related to vortex production at the arc boundary.