Self-Consistent 2-D Kinetic Simulations of High-Voltage Plasma Sheaths Surrounding Ion-Attracting Conductive Cylinders in Flowing Plasmas

Using the self-consistent steady-state 2-D Kinetic Plasma Solver (KIPS-2D), thorough characterizations are performed of high-voltage cylindrical sheaths surrounding ion-attracting conductive cylinders immersed in stationary as well as flowing collisionless plasmas. Analytical fits are obtained that allow for the accurate prediction of stationary sheath sizes for round-cylinder radii anywhere from one thousandth of a Debye length to five Debye lengths and for any bias potential beyond a small lower bound. Plasma flow is shown to progressively compress the sheath on its ram and lateral sides, down to a limit that closely matches the stationary frozen-ion sheath radius. Conversely, plasma flow is shown to cause a significant wake-side elongation of the sheath. The quasi-elliptical sheath-edge contours observed under flowing conditions can be characterized by their along-flow and across-flow dimensions. By normalizing these dimensions against stationary-sheath diameters, contour plots of the corresponding flow-effect correction factors can be obtained that account for plasma-flow velocity effects in a wide range of speed regimes and bias potentials. In this paper, Mach numbers up to ten and bias potentials from -10T e to -500T e (where T e is the electron temperature in units of volts) are simulated and corresponding correction factors are computed, although KiPS is capable of simulating even higher speeds and bias potentials. These correction factors appear to stabilize at high voltages, suggesting that their values at the highest simulated potential bias possibly can be used with reasonable accuracy to predict performance at even higher (but nonrelativistic) bias-potential values using analytical equations derived from stationary simulations. For example, at a Mach number of 1.1, the along-flow and across-flow sheath dimensions at high voltages are expected to be around 115% and 85% of the stationary-sheath diameter, respectively. Flow-effect correction factors for current collection are also obtained for the ram-side, wake-side, and total collected current. For the same plasma-velocity example, at high voltages, total current collection is minimized to about half of the stationary value, which would translate into a 50% reduction in power to collect the current. This example is of significance for Earth-radiation-belt remediation-system concepts using high-voltage tethers