The Influence of Plasma Distribution on Microwave Reflection in a Plasma-Metal Model

This article investigates the interaction of microwave with low-temperature plasma in a plasma-metal model of different plasma distributions. Due to the existence of sheath and different discharge conditions (gas pressure, shape of electrodes, input power, etc.), plasma usually exhibits a variety of spatial distributions. The distributions of plasma, for example, uniform, linear, parabola, and Epstein, have been employed to simulate the microwave propagation properties by finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) method. The influences of different spatial distributions of plasma on the microwave propagation have been demonstrated in detail. The results of the study could be important for the applications of microwave transmission in plasma.