The diffuse phase of high-voltage nanosecond atmospheric-pressure discharges in insulating gaps with a highly nonuniform electric field has been studied experimentally with the purpose of developing methods for protecting power supply equipment from natural and man-caused overvoltages. The structure of the discharge glow in 6- to 12-cm rod-plane gaps has been investigated for five configurations of the rod cathode. It is found that the discharge can exist in different forms and that the occurrence of one or another type of discharge is probabilistic in character. The electric characteristics of the discharge have been studied as functions of the electrode gap length for two types of cathode that provide the preferential development of volume and multichannel discharges. It is shown that the main factors governing the shape of the discharge glow are the distribution of the electric field near the cathode in the voltage growth phase and the dynamics of the accompanying discharge processes.
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Danchenko et al. (2005) studied this question.