Dischargebehavior of hollow cathode housed in mesh-cage

The influence of the discharge conditions, including but not limited to the high-power pulsed voltage, pulse frequency and pressure of argon in the hollow cathode housed in a mesh-cage, on the discharge behavior was investigated with plasma emission spectroscopy. The results show that the pulsed voltage, pulse frequency and argon pressure all have a major impact on the discharge characteristics. For example, a square voltage pulse resulted in a cusp-shaped current pulse, consisting of an exponential (〉1) increase and a rapid decrease of the current. As the pulsed voltage, pulse-frequency and argon pressure increased, the discharge of the hollow cathode housed in mesh-cage became significantly intensified, accompanied by the increasing densities of Ar^* and Ar⁺. The current peak increased with the increases of the pulsed voltage and argon pressure, but decreased with an increase of the pulse frequency.