Charge and force acting on a spherical body near a planar electrode in a polarizable conducting medium

A method for calculating electric fields in conducting polarizable media with interface is suggested. An integral equation for the density of surface charge induced at the interface is derived. The value of this density is used to find the field in the volume. The total charge induced at the interface and the force acting on a spherical body touching a planar electrode are calculated. It is found that the total charge and the force are alternating functions of the relative conductivity of the media; that is, both repulsion from and attraction to the electrode are possible depending on the conductivity. The near-electrode force acting on solid particles, bubbles, and drops in an immiscible liquid is studied experimentally.     

The shape of a drop in a constant electric field

The variation of the shape of a drop immersed in an immiscible liquid under the action of an electric field is calculated. The charge is transferred both by ohmic current through the interface and by the convective component over the interface. A solution quadratic in the parameter that is the ratio of the electric pressure to the capillary pressure is analyzed. Conditions where the drop transforms into a spheroid that is prolate or oblate along the electric field vector are found. An experimental study of the drop deformation by electric forces is carried out.     

Flow distribution and pressure of air due to ionic wind in pin-to-plate corona discharge system

An electrohydrodynamic investigation has been carried out in a pin-to-plate gas discharge system to clarify the mechanism of repulsive force generation between a pin and plate electrode at corona discharge. Numerical calculations have been conducted in two steps. First, the axi-cylindrical static corona discharge field was calculated with the finite-element method to deduce the Coulombic body force ρ E applied to the air, where ρ is the charge density and E is the electric field, and then the induced ionic wind was calculated with the finite differential method. The calculated pressure distribution on the plate electrode was on the order of 10 Pa which was in good agreement with the measured pressure distribution. The calculated air velocity at the center was several m/s and was confirmed by a time-of-flight experiment and the velocity distribution near the pin electrode also agreed with measurements using a laser Doppler velocimeter. Pressure and wind velocity were increased at high-applied voltage. These results confirm that the ionic wind is the cause of the repulsive force to the pin electrode at the corona discharge.     

Electrostatic force acting on conductive ball between electrodes

To advance electrostatic applications such as novel printing technologies and solder ball control for LSI bumping, the electrostatic force acting on a conductive ball between two electrodes is calculated. The electrostatic force increases as the ratio of the ball diameter to the electrode separation increases. The electrostatic force is also calculated for the case when a charge pattern is formed on the insulating layer on the upper electrode. In this case, the electrostatic force initially varies as the square of the charge pattern area but eventually plateaus to a constant value as the area increases. Experiments investigating the force acting on the ball are performed. The force estimated from these experiments agrees with the value obtained by electric field analysis.     

A semi-analytical approach using artificial neural network for dielectrophoresis generated by parallel electrodes

In this paper, we present a semi-analytical approach to obtain the DEP force generated by parallel electrodes. By solving the electric potential equation using the separation of variables method, a solution was found in the form of a Fourier series with unknown coefficients. The unknown coefficients were determined by training a linear artificial neural network with the appropriate data satisfied on the boundary. This results of calculated electric field and DEP force for both planar electrode system and 3D electrode system are validated by comparison with the numerical results obtained using the commercial software CFD-ACE+.     

Mechanism of electrohydrodynamically induced flow in a wire-non-parallel plate electrode type gas pump

An experimental investigation and one-dimensional modeling have been conducted to study the mechanism of net flow direction induced by electrohydrodynamic (EHD) forces in a wire-non-parallel plate electrode type EHD gas pump. The experiments were conducted with various different locations of corona wire electrode for negative and positive applied voltage from 0 to 14 kV at atmospheric pressure and room temperature, where air was used as the working fluid. A one-dimensional cross-sectional averaged model based on mass and momentum conservation as well as Poisson electric field and ion transport equations was also developed. The results show that the net flow direction of electrohydrodynamically induced gas flow in a wire-non-parallel plate electrode system significantly depends on the location of the corona wire electrode relative to the grounded electrode position. The effect of conversion angle of non-parallel plate electrode on the net flow direction and pressure drop also was investigated and discussed in detail.     

The effect of uni/bipolar charge injection on EHD conduction pumping

Electrohydrodynamics (EHD) conduction pumping takes advantage of Coulomb force generated by externally applied electric field and dissociated charges from electrolytes present in the working fluid. With the electric field maintained below the DC breakdown limit (i.e voltage required for charge injection), EHD conduction generated flow relies primarily upon the asymmetry of the electrodes where the flow is always generated toward the specific direction regardless of the electrodes polarity. The charge distribution induced by the process of dissociation may be altered by charge injection, potentially present at the electrodes' surfaces. The charge injection could occur, for example, because of the electrode surface roughness.This paper is a numerical investigation to quantify the impact of the charge injection on the performance of EHD conduction pump. The numerical domain comprises a coplanar asymmetric electrode pair embedded against a 2-D channel wall where the EHD conduction induced liquid flow is expected to be generated from the narrower electrode toward the wider electrode in the absence of charge injection. The electric field, net charge density, and electric body force distributions are presented in the absence and presence of charge injection. In addition, the electrically generated net flow is calculated for several operating conditions.     

Capillary oscillations and stability of a charged drop rotating about the axis of symmetry

The stability of a charged conductive liquid drop rotating about the axis of symmetry against the pressure of the self-charge electric field and inertial force pressure is investigated in an approximation linear in oscillation amplitude and square of the spheroidal drop deformation eccentricity. It is found that the axisymmetric modes of the rotating drop are stable. Only nonaxisymmetric modes with azimuthal numbers maximal for a given mode may be unstable. The Coriolis force plays a stabilizing role.     

Analytical model of a corona discharge from a conical electrode under saturation

Exact partial solutions are found for the electric field distribution in the outer region of a stationary unipolar corona discharge from an ideal conical needle in the space-charge-limited current mode with allowance for the electric field dependence of the ion mobility. It is assumed that only the very tip of the cone is responsible for the discharge, i.e., that the ionization zone is a point. The solutions are obtained by joining the spherically symmetric potential distribution in the drift space and the self-similar potential distribution in the space-charge-free region. Such solutions are outside the framework of the conventional Deutsch approximation, according to which the space charge insignificantly influences the shape of equipotential surfaces and electric lines of force. The dependence is derived of the corona discharge saturation current on the apex angle of the conical electrode and applied potential difference. A simple analytical model is suggested that describes drift in the point-plane electrode geometry under saturation as a superposition of two exact solutions for the field potential. In terms of this model, the angular distribution of the current density over the massive plane electrode is derived, which agrees well with Warburg??s empirical law.     

Characteristics of the process of reorientation of bipolar drops of a nematic with rigidly fixed poles

The director configuration in a bipolar drop of a nematic with rigidly fixed poles is calculated as a function of the electric field directed perpendicular to the symmetry axis of the drop. It is shown that the reorientation of the drop is a dual process: a threshold process in the region where the initial director orientation is orthogonal to the electric field, and a nonthreshold process elsewhere in the drop. A relation for determining the critical field is obtained. Experimental investigations of the characteristics of scattered light for a film of polymer-encapsulated liquid crystals confirm the computational results. Pis’ma Zh. éksp. Teor. Fiz. 67, No. 9, 696–700 (10 May 1998)     

Molecular dynamics simulation of the response of bi-disperse polyelectrolyte brushes to external electric fields

Langevin dynamics simulations have been performed to investigate the response of bi-disperse and strong polyacid chains grafted on an electrode to electric fields generated by opposite surface charges on the polyelectrolyte(PE)-grafted electrode and a second parallel electrode. Simulation results clearly show that, under a negative external electric field, the longer grafted PE chains are more strongly stretched than the shorter ones in terms of the relative change in their respective brush heights. Whereas under a positive external electric field, the grafted shorter chains collapse more significantly than the longer ones. It was found that, under a positive external electric field, the magnitude of the total electric force acting on one shorter PE chain is larger than that on one longer PE chain, or vice versa. The effects of smeared and discrete charge distributions of grafted PE chains on the response of PE brushes to external electric fields were also examined.     

非链式脉冲氟化氘激光器的放电特性

为了提升非链式DF激光器输出能量与电光转换效率, 使用有限元分析法, 分别计算了Chang氏电极和粗糙阴极与光滑阳极组成的平板电极间的静电场分布。对于Chang氏电极, 引入了火花针尖端强电场, 计算了火花针紫外预电离放电的电场分布。对于平板电极, 计算了阴极表面毛刺尖端的静电场分布, 发现毛刺会在阴极表面形成一系列较高强度的电场区域而不会导致平板电极间电场均匀性恶化。进而对两种电极进行了脉冲放电实验, 获得了非链式脉冲DF激光器的放电特性和输出参数。实验结果表明:均匀电场分布有利于提高非链式脉冲DF激光器的输出能量;自引发DF激光器阴极毛刺尖端强电场有利于实现体放电;自引发放电更适用于大体积均匀放电。     

Rotation of a single vortex in dusty plasma

A single vortex is obtained in radio-frequency capacitive discharge in argon gas. The dust subsystem is confined in the horizontal plane with an asymmetrical saw structure placed on the lower electrode. The vortex rotates as a whole along the long side of the saw-teeth. Asymmetry of the saw structure plays an important role in the rotation of the vortex. Nonzero curl of the total force resulting from the local ion flow and the electric field in the plasma sheath could be attributed to the persistent rotation of vortex.     

Force and torque on a sphere with electric dipole moment moving in a dielectric fluid in the presence of a uniform magnetic field

The torque exerted by a magnetic field on a sphere with permanent electric dipole moment moving steadily in a dielectric fluid is calculated to lowest order in the dipole moment. Hence the force exerted on a steadily rotating sphere with electric dipole moment is found by Onsager symmetry. The modification from the vacuum values of torque and force depends only on the slip parameter and the static dielectric constant of the fluid. It is suggested that for a macroscopic ferro electric sphere the calculated effects could be measured experimentally without great difficulty.     

Trapping single molecules by dielectrophoresis

We have trapped single protein molecules of R-phycoerythrin in an aqueous solution by an alternating electric field. A radio frequency voltage is applied to sharp nanoelectrodes and hence produces a strong electric field gradient. The resulting dielectrophoretic forces attract freely diffusing protein molecules. Trapping takes place at the electrode tips. Switching off the field immediately releases the molecules. The electric field distribution is computed, and from this the dielectrophoretic response of the molecules is calculated using a standard polarization model. The resulting forces are compared to the impact of Brownian motion. Finally, we discuss the experimental observations on the basis of the model calculations.     

电极与导电纸之间接触压降的测量方法

在用稳恒电流场模拟静电场的实验中，人们通常忽略了电极与导电纸之间的接触压降。本文讨论了接触压降的存在，并给出了测量接触压降的方法。     

一种针对弱场搜寻态冷极性分子的可控静电表面囚禁方案

提出一种使用带电金属环和六个球电极和一个外加偏置电场实现对冷极性分子静电囚禁的新方案.计算装载和囚禁时空间电场分布.囚禁中心距离芯片表面的高度可以通过外电场和环形电极所加电压来操控.蒙特卡罗模拟表明对于中心速度为15 m·s^-1的ND₃分子束,装载效率可以达到70%,得到冷分子的温度大约为45 mK.当继续增加偏置电场强度时,单阱分裂为对称的两个阱.如果同时改变球形电极上所加电压,得到不对称的两个阱,可以借此来调节两个阱中所囚禁的冷分子数目的比例.为了易于理解,用蒙特卡罗方法模拟了装载、囚禁、分裂冷分子波包的动力学过程.     

Two-parametric family of exact solutions for the profile of the surface of a conducting liquid in a nonuniform electric field

Possible equilibrium configurations of the free surface of a conducting liquid in an external nonuniform electric field are investigated. The liquid is at the tip of a wedge-shaped electrode, and the counter-elecrode is a thin straight conducting filament parallel to the edge of the wedge. The conformal mapping method is used to obtain a two-parametric family of exact solutions for the shape of the surface. The solutions describe the deformation of the surface right to separation of a drop from the electrode.     

Optical motor: Towards the model of life emerge

We show that strong incoherent broad band light in random media pushes an electron in opposite to an electric force direction. The effective electron-electron interaction becomes attractive in this case, electric current flows in opposite to a voltage drop direction and static polarization is induced in opposition to an applied electric field. The induced effective electron-electron attraction results in the electron coagulation and this light driven self-organization might have been the initial pre-biotic stage in life emerge on Earth.     

Some effects of the electrostatic interaction of water drops in the atmosphere

The electric field at the surface of two conducting spherical charged particles and their interaction force are calculated. It is shown that as particles carrying like charge approach each other, the force changes sign and becomes attractive. The case where the charge on each particle varies as the square of its radius is an exception (repulsion at any distance between the particles). Self-similar asymptotic solutions for the interaction force and energy are found for particles of identical size. For a pair of charged water drops falling simultaneously in the atmosphere, a numerical simulation shows that a drop formed by coalescence of the pair may be subject to the Rayleigh instability. Zh. Tekh. Fiz. 69, 12–17 (December 1999)